#i wrote my own version of this story but it's pretty similar :)

[gameo-archive]

"The world needs more Edwin and Charles."

Can you share the headcannon that you and Jayden came up for the Infamous Puppy Debacle of '94?

You've previously said that the mirror scene with Despair was a particularly neat experience. What particularly made that scene and working with Donna [Preston] meaningful to you?

What a kind and thoughtful response from George. I love his aside about getting to express how much Kirby’s version of Death from The Sandman meant to him (If you haven’t seen that episode of The Sandman, you may want to consider watching it. I believe it was episode 6. Her portrayal of Death is compassionate and empathetic and very different from anything I have seen before). I love that he is a fan of her and Donna, as much as we are of him.

Here we also hear the headcannon behind the infamous puppy debacle of ‘94 and more from his last day of filming.

Anyway. Truly a lovely response. Sharing here for you all to enjoy as well.

[sailoryooons]

I am going to say something that has really been bothering me that not everyone may agree with, which is totally okay, everyone is entirely valid to disagree with me: There is a fast fashion problem in fandom, specifically fanfiction.

Disclaimer: This conversation is not about broadly writing the same tropes, genres, and ideas. I am not talking about people writing fics with similar themes or the same name. I am specifically talking about people writing fics that are very obviously heavily influenced by other fics. This is not me talking about: I wrote __ character as enemies to lovers vampires and so did this person so they stole. Please do not trivialize this conversation with instances that are very obviously not what I'm talking about.

As someone who exists in the fanfiction space, I want to express what I have seen specifically in this space in my own experience, my mutuals experiences, and random experiences I have seen on my dash.

Recently, it seems like there is a reoccurring theme of writers (often new writers) taking "inspiration" from fanfics that they love and value and essentially creating their own version of that story to the point it is bordering on plagiarism. I say bordering on plagiarism because while people may not be copying line for line or entire scenes in order, you can tell that it is a re-arranged duplicate of another story.

I am not talking about writing similar tropes and dynamics. No one owns a trope or a dynamic. I am specifically talking about people taking the plots, scenes, concept and core of fanfics and recreating it and changing some plot elements or placing it in a different alternate universe and calling it their own, when at the heart of that fanfic, it is taken from someone else's creation.

This to me, reads like people who read a work, fall in love with it, but think 'this is easy to do, I can do this myself' and they end up making a replica of a fic that you can tell is a replica of another fic, despite adding some changes. Nine times out of ten, these inspired fics lack the obvious thought and heart the original writer put into it.

Which, begs the question: How is this different than fanfic writers taking inspiration from media (i.e. published books, movies, music, shows)? Because fanfiction is meant to replicate a specific something from published media. It is not meant to duplicate an already established fanfiction contribution.

I know that the nuance between that line is very ambiguous and it brings up the discourse on 'should there be fanfiction of fanfiction' - to which my response is it is, generally, pretty obvious what the difference between being inspired by a fic and copying a fic are.

In the last few months, I have lost count of how many times I or mutuals have a) discovered someone has been writing a story based off of their fic 2) have been asked to use an already written work to make their own or 3) already have started writing works modeled after an already written work and in hindsight asked the author if they could keep doing so (this third instance almost always happens after someone accuses them of stealing another work).

This feels like the fast fashion industry. Someone finds a story that is popular (whatever that means to the individual), takes all of the elements they think makes the story works, rearranges it, posts it as their own and and says they were 'inspired' (if they credit the original story at all).

This is why so many works that readers are coming across feel like they are the same thing. It is the same A + B + C = D over and over and over again, because people are outright just taking what they think works from other stories and using it.

Again - I am not talking about people who come across a trope, AU, genre or dynamic they like and add something similar to their story. I am talking about the people who are very intentionally and obviously writing the same exact fic with their own 'twist' (whatever that means).

Why is this a problem (beyond the fact that it's essentially roundabout plagiarism)? You're taking the heart, soul, and creativity someone poured into something and posting it on your own and robbing it of the originality, the essence, and the intention behind it. You cannot replicate a writer's feelings and obvious emotions that they have poured into the original work, and it shows. And it is gutting to the original authors who are finding remixes of their work across the fanfiction space.

Please consider whether or not you are inspired by a story or if you are redoing it in your own image. If you find yourself worried enough about your story that you feel like you have to publicly credit someone to avoid scrutiny, perhaps the question needs to be asked of whether you're just redoing what someone else already wrote.

Please do not confuse inspiration and recreation. 9 out of 10 authors will love that they inspired you to write, but would not love to find that you wrote a fic inspired by them that is a rearranged or hollowed-out version of the fic they wrote.

The fanfic space wants and needs more writers, but it does not need people unwilling to create their own art, instead taking bits and pieces from others and calling it a success.

Also adding: This problem also directly contributes to 'smaller' writers or more niche (often queer and bipoc) stories not getting the hype, readership, or recognition they deserve. On more than one occasion I've seen stories that had explicitly queer or bipoc characters taken and turned into heteronormative or white-presenting stories.

Note: This 1000% goes for actual visual art as well, including gifs etc. in fandom but I'm not well-versed there and thus, did not include it.

[suzuran777]

Review: Ooe -Zenpen- (Adelta)

The first part of Adelta's new BL visual novel "Ooe" was finally released on the 25th last month! The second part is scheduled to be released in winter, but the first part was already so good I highly recommend playing it. I’ve been waiting for this game for a long time and also wrote some general information/theories about the game on this blog some years ago, as well as a review of the trial version. I won't mention any big plot-related spoilers, so if you’re waiting for an English version or are just curious what the game is about, you can still check it out!

Synopsis 30th year of the Showa era (1955), our protagonist Oosaki works for a small detective agency and one day receives a strange request from a client. He's asked to attend a memorial service on behalf of his client, which will be held on the remote island of Ooejima. During his stay on the island, a series of strange events happen, and the ship that was supposed to pick them up never arrives. The organizer who invited them is not there, and shortly afterwards they also lose all contact with the outside world. Stranded on this ominous island, ten people unravel the mystery of their shared pasts and the death of the actress An Ooe.

This version of the game focuses on three different routes, Ariake, Shimbashi and Aomi. Similar to previous Adelta games, you play all of the routes in a pre-decided route order, and with each route you finish, a new choice will show up allowing you to proceed to the next route. As I mentioned in one of my previous blog posts, each character was assigned one earthly desire/mental factor that kind of describes the character, so I will also include this again below. Now I've played the game I know that these factors are definitely not their only personality trait, but some parts of it definitely show up in the story eventually.

Ariake -  Disregard (Anapatrapya 無愧): A mortician who likes helping out those in need. After injuring his dominant hand, he has been receiving a lot of help from others. He's immediately very fond of Oosaki and wants to follow him everywhere. His mental factor pretty much indicates that he doesn't consider his own actions 'bad'.

Shimbashi -  Stinginess (Mātsarya 慳): A screenwriter who speakes in a rather strange way, combining overly-polite speach and insults. When he first meets Oosaki, he doesn't seem to trust him at all and doesn't want to tell him anything. His mental factor refers to him only wanting to satisfy his own desires, and doesn't intend to share anything with others.

Aomi -  Envy (Īrṣyā 嫉): A quiet music teacher who doesn’t talk a lot, and when he does speak, it’s limited to short sentences only. He doesn't like small talk and sometimes when Oosaki asks him something Aomi simply ignores him. His mental factor doesn't need much explanation, but even though it's envy I must say that he's not the overly-jealous type (?). It kind of refers to something more specific in his route which I can't really mention without spoiling.

I don't think you really need a guide for this game as it's pretty obvious when new choices unlock, just start a new game after finishing the first route and you'll see! Ariake does have an alternative ending scene, so during your second playthrough don’t immediately pick the choice that leads to Shimbashi’s route, and return to Ariake’s route one more time. Afterwards you can proceed as usual. Sometimes a few choices pop up, but selecting the wrong choice has no consequences and you’ll just be re-directed to the choice menu. The wind chime sound effect indicates which one is the correct choice, but I kind of enjoyed seeing everyone’s nervous reactions while falsely accusing them of something, so I recommend that too since there really are no consequences. By the way, important items are easy to notice because of their red color, like the record in the record player you can see below. Same goes for any text written in red, it might become relevant later (maybe even in part 2).

Introduction to the story Oosaki lives in a boarding house in Suga, a short walk from Hiratsuka station near Kamakura. His boss Shinkiba, who runs the detective agency, informs him about a request he received from a client. The client, a man who calls himself Shizuma Daiba, asks Oosaki to attend the memorial service of actress An Ooe on his behalf. According to Daiba, it was his father who received the invitation, however he fell ill shortly afterwards. Oosaki assumes that the person who invited him is a relative of the actress. Even though Oosaki never met her, he remembers reading news about her death. which shocked him because she was quite young and died by setting herself on fire. Even though it's a rather strange request and Shinkiba warns Oosaki, he still decides to travel to Ooejima. The island belongs to the Izu Island group and is located near Hachijojima. Originally, it was used as a military base during the Second World War, however after this it became uninhabited. Even though he has never been there, Oosaki knows about the island because his grandma who raised him was originally from this island, and he always felt like he'd travel to the island some day.

On his way to the island, he meets one of the other main characters in this game, Ariake, who’s also travelling to Ooejima for the memorial service. He’s surprised to find out Ariake’s grandmother is also from the island. After arriving at the Mikazuki inn, he receives a warm welcome from a trembling man with a knife (??), who later introduces himself as Funeno. He also meets Shimbashi who's staying at the same inn. The other characters are all staying at a different inn, but Oosaki meets them pretty soon too (Takeshiba, Shijoumae, Hinode, Aomi and Shiodome). The final character, Toyosu, appears a bit later and mentions he's in charge of the memorial service because the individual who invited them all (who nobody seems to know) couldn't come after all, which leaves everyone confused.

Since this is mentioned in the promotional material and also happens in the trial version, I think it's not really a spoiler to mention that Funeno is the first character who gets killed shortly after this. They decide to perform a ritual to put his spirit to rest, which involves burning a straw figure, though when they finally burn it they discover someone swapped the straw figure with Funeno's body and they end up burning his body instead... Afterwards, Shiodome reveals that they didn't just receive invitation letters, but they also got a letter describing the crimes one of the other attendees committed. They were all swapped, so everyone has a letter that belongs to someone else and knows about their crimes. The orders is as follows: Funeno > Daiba > ??? > Shimbashi > Takeshiba > Aomi > Toyosu > Hinode > Shijoumae > Ariake > Shiodome > Funeno. I guess now we know why Funeno acted so nervous around Oosaki, as he introduced himself as ''Daiba'' and Funeno got Daiba's letter...

Oosaki didn't receive any of these letters from Daiba though, so after they all return the letters to each other, Shimbashi is the only one who doesn't get his own letter, and let's just say he's not too happy about that. This also means that characters who had each other's letters know about their crimes, which is why some of them seem to be rather uncomfortable around each other. Most of the routes branch off a little bit after the scene where the trial version ends, and then the real murder mystery story starts in which they try to figure out who killed Funeno. Someone also destroyed the phone, so now there's no way to contact anyone anymore. At this point Oosaki's of course also suspicious of his client Daiba, because it's clear he was hiding something from him and sent Oosaki to the island without telling him important information.

Personal thoughts Since it’s a murder mystery game you never know which characters to trust, and because characters do die and will be absent throughout the entire route, it was a really suspenseful experience. I was interested in the story from start to finish, which is why I finished it so fast... I can't explain the feeling of dread every time one of the characters announced that something bad had happened, and you're wondering how bad it could really be. Even though the game doesn't show any super gory CGs (the most they'll show is blood), the descriptions are very detailed, so I think even without that it's easy to understand what happened to them. I also liked how the characters who die and survive are different depending on which route you play, so the game really stays interesting in all three routes.

Even though we know a second part of the game is coming, part 1 doesn't feel incomplete at all and the routes work very well on their own! So if you can read Japanese or want to use translation tools, I highly recommend playing this. It took me over 30 hours to finish the game, including the common route which is about 5 hours long, but I do play pretty fast and am already replaying some scenes, so it might be even longer. Also according to a message that came with the game, part 2's data will be free for everyone who buys part 1, so you don't need to buy them separately. I do want the physical version of the game, but I don't mind spending a bit more because the game's only 4400 yen (unlike most VNs which are about 8000-9000 yen).

My personal favorite character is Shimbashi because of his cat-like characteristics and short temper, I guess he's a bit of a tsundere now I think about it, but I also really like the abnormal way he speaks... he's super polite and extremely rude at the same time and I am curious how this would get translated in the English version. My second favorite is probably Ariake, and because he was the first route I expected his route to be good too, since it's the first experience anyone will have with this game after all. The final route is Aomi, who I was pretty neutral about when they showed him in the promotional material, but I really liked him... I should really not underestimate any character in this game because they will prove me wrong, and so far I really like everyone. I suddenly remember when the game was announced they said all the characters are ''straight'' lol, but as expected, so far it just means they haven't been together with another man before. They do not seem to care about Oosaki's gender at all and don't make it a big deal (I also like how there's multiple lines in this game acknowledging other gender identities btw... it's mentioned out of nowhere but I love to see it). If you didn't know btw, the protag of this game is a top, all of the previous Adelta game protagonists were bottoms.

I've always liked the Adelta game artstyle and character designs, but somehow the art in this game looks even better. Every CG in Ooe just looks so beautiful and I can't stop opening the CG gallery to look at it over and over again. As for the eye color... I also have my theories because in previous games this was an important plot element, and even by just looking at the promotional material, it's clear that those with ties to Ooejima are the only characters who have red eyes, so maybe that will be mentioned in the next part? Also every character has their own ending song, similar to what they did with Uuultra C. The game actually has no opening song/movie, but they might be saving that for part 2. The ending songs are so good though at this point I will not even complain.

The references to existing literature in this game are also comparible to the older Adelta titles, for example the caves on the island kind of remind me of the novel "Kotou no Oni" and the game sometimes references Agatha Christie’s "And Then There Were None" too, with Oosaki even owning a copy of the book, and eventually comparing the people on the island to characters in the book. As I mentioned in my first blog post about this game, some of the characters' first names also reference other novel characters. For example, Shiodome’s name is Michio, which is also an important character in "Kotou no Oni", Daiba’s name is Shizuma, which seems to be referencing a character in "Inugami-ke no Ichizoku" or "The Inugami Family" (this applies to the names of his brother and father too), and Funeno’s first name is Kureichirou, which is the name of one of the main characters in "Dogra Magra". In part 1, we learn the first names of a couple of other characters too for the first time, and I do have some theories what these could be referencing, especially Takeshiba's... I also want to know more about Shiodome because I mean, from the beginning it's clear the way he behaves isn't exactly what one would consider "normal", so I wonder how he would interact with Oosaki... Cool-B did preview one of his 18+ scenes and I have many questions. Then of course there's Daiba... he's so suspicious and the promotional material keeps referring to him as a ''side character'' even though he was literally on the cover of Cool-B magazine combined with Oosaki and Ariake, so I have my doubts about that.

Honestly there's so many things I could write about but at this point I might be theorizing too much and not actually reviewing the game, but I really don't want to spoil, so I think that's it for now! Part 2 is scheduled to be released in winter, though I'm not sure if that means December, January or later. You can buy part 1 here though! Please support them. It was mentioned that they are planning to release an English and Chinese version, though any information about that will have to wait until the release of part 2. When part 2 is released I'll write a review about that too!

[official-darkforest]

i am SOOO unbelievably thrilled by your anthro au omg. do you have fashion ideas for the characters? like their favorite outfits, fabrics, etc? imo one of the best parts of anthro characters is deciding how they'd express themselves through their clothing :]

I HAVE A FEW ALREADY!!!! i dont have many specifics because theres so many characters ahd i havent drawn them all yet LOL but i'll share the ones i do have at least SOMETHING for

im also trying to keep these reasonable for the time period and location, as in my au the clan cats are mostly rural and in small towns set (mostly) before the 2000s so most may dress more modest and conservative (especially if theyre older and very religious)

squirrelflight - the best i can describe her sense of fashion is that it ranged from tomboy as a younger girl and is currently closer to a working class butch. im not sure if masc would be a more appropriate term since i dont hc her as a lesbian (shes bi) but she dresses "like a man" and owns a lot of jeans, slacks, and button-up shirts of all kinds of fabrics and patterns. she also enjoys bright colors as well, but as she got older her fashuon sense got a little more sensible and less "loud" like it was in the 60s and 70s. she also has glasses like her daddy once shes like 35 or so. she and firestar dressed very similarly, and a lot of her shirts and neckties are things she stole from his closet

feathertail - very feminine. hippie adjacent, lots of loose and flowing garments and jingly pieces. breatheable clothes and open toed shoes. her favorite swimsuit had some little frilly bits on it i think. often combines neutral earthy tones with blues and whites

crowfeather - lots of handmedowns from his father. clothes you can do farmwork in like jeans, overalls, hardy flannel/denim shirts and boots. never grew out of this and still dresses this way and he likes it

jayfeather - he looks like a modernized (as far as the 80s goes) version of his father - same hairstyle snd way of dress. he isnt too formal but does have some more preppiness to his clothing style (polo shirts and sweaters). he avoids full button downs since buttoning them himself jjust gets frustrating since he cant match them up every time. new wave band shirts. he also wears orange tinted glasses to protect his eyes (in this au i wrote that hes able to perceive shadows and light pretty okay, but not much else beyond that) And Kinda As A Fashion Statement cuz it goes well with his facial structure and hairstyle i think

lionblaze - hes like if the stereotypical jock and stereotypical 80s rock+metal enthusiast had a baby. muscle tees and bandanas, ripped jeans, those absurdly short shorts, crop tops, etc. he's a drummer i think if that matters LOL

ivypool - punk, also sorta like joan jett to an extent. very homemade, tho sometimes she gets lazy and doesnt really commit to the outfits all the way (but definitely has the mindset, dint get me wrong). one of those girls with a chest small enough to go braless 99% of the time; wears a lot of tank tops and sleeveless shirts LOL

bone/brick/scourge - just google "the outsiders movie" or "greaser" and you'll get the idea. tho i imagine these three in particular also have some kind of bare minimum formalwear scraped together from their escapades. theyre kinda like the jetts/sharks from west side story if that helps at all

daisy - she combines flowing, pretty dresses with a sunhat and work boots. she also teaches horseback riding and owns a few (its a business she runs w smokey and floss. i think its be funny if they were polyam ITS MY AU I CAN CHANGE WHAT I WANT) and she has horseback-appropriate clothing as well

poppyfrost - THEE preppy girl of the 80s. big hair, perm and all. dresses with pastel colors. her sisters cinderheart and honeyfern are pretty similar, tho i imagine honeyfern is a little more sporty and cinderheart takes inspiration from madonna once shes trying to court lionblaze

hazeltail - long haired country girl butch. enough said

spottedleaf snd cinderpelt are nuns lol

[buffyfan145]

I got the first 2 episodes in of "Rings of Power" s2 and they were amazing!!! 😀 Worth waking up at 5 am to watch. LOL I still got ep 3 to watch and will this afternoon, but need to get my thoughts out here behind a cut, but so happy with s2 so far. Not tagging all the characters, as it seems to think too many is spam, so hopefully this goes in the tags and I talk about most.

First off, I loved seeing Sauron's backstory in ep 1!!! 😀 I mentioned before in my other posts that I'm a fan of Jack Lowden's and it was great getting to see him after the version Adar knew. I only expect Jack back in flashbacks if he's able, even more so seeing a new interview with Charlie this morning assuring fans that he won't be recast. The whole prologue explained so much about what happened with Adar, and then Sauron reforming eventually into Halbrand. Also confirmed he really was going to Númenor on his own, and his meeting with Galadriel really was by chance so those theories he planned it all along were wrong.

Charlie's doing amazing too both as Halbrand and now as Annatar. I loved all the shoutouts too to "The Silmarillion" and other 1st Age stories about him, including him being The Lord of the Werewolves and able to talk with that wolf. Then the Bible references as we knew about the Annatar transformation scene looking like Jesus and angel paintings, but also the "Let My People Go!" scene fit with Moses and especially the "Prince of Egypt" movie, which I love too. But also realized at times they way they're doing (and Tolkien wrote) Sauron rising from nothing to being aids to kings is so similar to the Bible story of Joseph, and the musical "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" (which my high school did an amazing version of that music my junior year of high school LOL). So I loved all of this and everything we saw with Celebrimbor in ep 2.

Then with Galadriel!!! 😀 OMG, first I have to mention about those Haladriel scenes!!! We knew the rings were going to connect them, as well as their mental bond in general, but now she's seeing visions and knows Sauron is in Eregion and saw him there. Plus, hearing him call her name in that vision, and confirming that she can read his mind, and him hers (as he knew the rings worked). Then the big one where Galadriel confessed to Elrond about how she feels about Halbrand/Sauron (and still used his Halbrand name) and it clearly was showing us that she fell in love with him by using that flashback to the "I felt it too" scene, and that's why everything that happened and being deceived hurt her so much. And Elrond knows now, which is why he and Gil Galad are being like that to her now as they don't trust her around Sauron anymore and think she'll turn. Loving that we're getting scenes about Haladriel even if they both are actually in the same place.

Then I loved the scene with the rings and showing they are good and worked to help restore the elves. Absolutely love Círdan too and being a mentor to Elrond. Him talking about more 1st Age characters and their flaws was great too. LOL

The storyline with The Stranger, Nori, and Poppy is great too. He's got to be Gandalf. I thought this the whole time but every scene I see of him just confirms it to me.

Pretty sure Ciarán Hinds' character is one of the Blue Wizards. The show did supposedly get the rights to use the Blue Wizards stories that Tolkien wrote in "Unfinished Tales" and one of the 2 Blues went evil in the 2nd Age in Rhûn, similar to how Saruman did in the 3rd Age. So I'm pretty sure that's what we're seeing him and that he found a cult with the Mystics.

Then loved seeing more with Durin, Disa, and the dwarves. It's setting up Sauron/Annatar giving them the 7 rings, and the making of the Doors of Durin too. Also very cool seeing Narvi too and the female dwarves having facial hair similar to more male elves having long hair (this didn't bother me like it did other fans but cool to see them add it). Though also really sad about the singing not working.

So now getting ready to watch ep 3 this afternoon and I saw from the description that it involves other characters we haven't seen yet from s1, and then I'll be caught up till ep 4 next week.

[misscammiedawn]

You may have discussed it before, but would you mind speaking a little bit on how you discovered you have DID?

I feel like I have a pretty stable core identity but there have been times under intense stress where I’ve experienced sudden “switches” in my personality. During a particularly bad period for a little over a year there was a time where I distinctly felt like a different person and did things I wouldn’t normally do, and I remember the specific moment where I came back into my body and became “me” again. This doesn’t happen often, but it has happened more than once throughout my life. When I see people talk about plurality I feel a little confused because their identities often seem to have their own names and genders and ages and backstories, and it seems so cut-and-dry.

I know these are all things to discuss with my therapist but I love how you talk about your own experiences. How can you differentiate between DID and other kinds of dissociation?

Thank you for asking, anon! I'm glad you are going to talk to your therapist about it while also doing the reading and reaching out-- heaven knows our own journey within the US mental healthcare system was rocky at best. The latest chapter of Madison/Belladonna is heavily sourced from IRL circumstances both in receiving the diagnosis and the decades long journey in the mental healthcare system to get there.

But to answer more directly-- (as always we are answering from a psychopathology lens for care and treatment, we recognize the beauty of plurality and do not reduce ALL experiences to mental healthcare concerns, we are approaching our own situation and experiences this way as it is how we lived it)

Our journey was guided from the outside. Both therapists and our partner who was able to see these "mood swings" in us were able to gently guide us to water despite our fierce denial and rejection of our situation. What started as "we're fine" turned to "mood swings" turned to "BPD" turned to "---maybe we should read up on OSDD?" Turned to our current therapist telling us over a year ago that we had DID after months of testing and interviewing to determine.

I should also note I likely realized it MULTIPLE times in my history and buried it again and again. I legitimately think that people in my former life knew and either assumed I knew too or worse I had told them and forgot that I told them. It worries me because I cannot ever be certain. I once asked my ex-wife about it after the divorce/diagnosis and she did say it was weird how she had a "different husband" depending on environment and social group. She said she never noticed it during the interactions, but she would always think back and feel that the "me" in any given moment was different from the ones she observed in social/work situations etc.

So like--- even if people notice, sometimes they don't even realize what they're seeing. Honestly I go full No Mask at work even when a male part fronts and no one really bats an eye. I don't think *most* people are as observant as we worry they are.

ANYWAY! Looking back these are the signs that I ignored:

- I not just wrote a consistent journal through every phase of my life (even going as far as to have a "memory list" that I populated "when I felt like it" (<- IE: when a part that associated with the memory was fronting and wanted to type about it) and more importantly I READ it. Often. I sometimes think that the majority of our memories are just imagined versions of what we wrote. That notion is helped by the fact we [used to] stop journaling during times of crisis or delete journal/chat log to prevent us thinking about distressing things.

- I wrote a lot of plural characters in my stories since my teenage years. Kinda like I kept writing female versions of myself? Funny how the Trans and DID acceptance arcs are so dang similar.

- I would emotionally cave in on myself after gatherings, berating myself for how I had acted all evening. Getting deeply upset at how "out of control" I was. We outright AVOID mood altering substances like alcohol or weed.

- When talking about traumatic memories we typically just tell the story rote. It doesn't bother us. We told therapists without batting an eyelid. This is dissociation. We were disconnecting ourselves from our memories. Emotionally distancing ourselves from the experiences.

- In the same vein, when we remember things we imagine things in locations like a 3rd person camera. Not populated. We don't hear or feel or associate. It's just a place and a knowledge. Our whole "context packet" thing where we just understand something without *feeling* it.

- Deleted emails and chatlogs, references to things we don't remember. Discord messages with people we don't remember talking to. It bothers me how many people in our online communities we were actually close to at some stage of our life and then erased. This is specific to us but Dawn has opened many accounts in the hypnokink community and Camden has shut them down and this has happened so many times that we don't even get upset when we find a buried email from 2013 with sign-up to a Yahoo Email account we don't remember having. That sounds dramatic. It's more just. Go into your emails, pull stuff up from 5-10 years ago and just scroll a while. See how much you remember and associate into. It's NORMAL to forget what websites you were browsing a decade ago. It's not normal to have an entire *LIFE* you hid from yourself.

- Sometimes people just... saw/knew us before we did and there were times when they would describe a version of us they weren't supposed to see and we got complete dysphoria over it. Sometimes it as joyful. Someone we love saw Cammie well enough to say when we transitioned that they wanted to see that "windswept girl with the big smile" all of the time. Sometimes it's mortifying, like when someone approaches Camden as if she is Dawn and Camden REJECTED that side of us so heavily that it caused emotional meltdowns and turmoil because Camden didn't WANT to be a sexy confident domme, she could barely see herself as a woman, when people saw the wrong version of us *without permission* it was just a violation that made things WORSE.

- On that note-- meltdowns-- we mentioned the whole "after a social gathering we'd emotionally cave in on ourselves" thing, there was a lot of that. After work we'd get a complete drop from having to be in Manager Mode all day or we'd have a crisis after erotic intimacy encounters because we're sex repulsed ace. The fact is our nervous system was activated during those times, our survival instincts were kicked in and brought the part associated to the surface to DEAL and when they backed off our body was still reacting to the trauma trigger and it would cause us to implode.

All of these things in therapy brought us to the conclusion of BPD. Because therapists be like that at times. A *TRAUMA* therapist gave us some DES-II, MID and ACE tests and worked out what was going on within 3 months.

It took a further 6-9 months with constant support from loved ones who were able to see us as individuals to *ACCEPT* it. This is a denial disorder, it doesn't want to be found. Asking questions, being honest and being accepting is the best way to come to terms with it. I wish it were easier and I wish you luck and support in your journey. Our inbox is always open!

You're not alone <3

[fayoftheforest]

human kite & antisemitism

In the notes of my recent meta on Vampire Kyle AUs, a user reflected on how similar antisemitic stereotypes might overlap with his TFBW character as well. Since I also have some thoughts on this and enjoyed putting together the last lil post I thought I’d do another on this subject too :) 

South Park Fandom Wiki states that Human Kite is heavily inspired by Superman, “being a faraway alien with the ability to fly and to shoot lasers out of his eyes, even wearing a costume with the color red, yellow, and blue and a symbol in his chest to match.”  I think this is pretty cool! Superman was created by Jewish immigrants and is very Jewish-coded in his origin story, being “a refugee with the Hebrew-inspired name ‘Kal-El’ who escaped a dying world and fought Nazis during World War II” (JewishUnpacked). I don’t know if Tratt were aware of these roots, but either way, I think it’s pretty neat :)

South Park Fandom Wiki also claims that Kyle playing an alien character “may be a reference to how Adolf Hitler did not consider Jews ‘human.’" This is. Uh. Less neat.

Similarly upsetting is the name itself, Human Kite, which is a play on words with the horrific ethnic slur “kike.” American Jewish Committee posits that the term “is derived from the Yiddish word for circle, ‘kikel,’ a reference to how Jewish immigrants at Ellis Island signed their entry forms: a circle as opposed to an X, which Jews associated with the cross of Christianity. Immigration officers described those who signed forms with a circle as ‘kikel,’ eventually being shortened to ‘kike.’”

Did Matt and Trey really create his entire character just so that Cartman could call him Human Kike that one time? I can’t say for certain, just in the same way I don’t have a direct quote from them confirming the reasoning behind their selections of names for Kyle and Ike. But I can tell you that if you put ‘em together and you get… yeah. Yep. “Kike” again. Thank you, Tratt, very cool 👍Get a new joke maybe :/

Now, let’s talk specifically about his laser powers. Up until researching for this meta, I had presumed that Kyle’s ability to shoot lasers from his eyes was a direct reference to the Jewish Space Laser conspiracy popularised to the public by terrifyingly influential political figure Marjorie Taylor Greene. In 2018, Greene wrote a Facebook rant speculating that the California wildfires were caused by a giant laser floating in space, owned by the Jews. Very normal thing to believe :|

However, during my research, I realised that these timelines did not match up. As mentioned, Greene’s rant was shared in 2018, but didn’t go viral until 2021. Meanwhile, South Park’s The Fractured But Whole was released way back in 2017! What I had initially assumed was another antisemitic reference is in fact just a dreadful and ridiculous coincidence. Nonetheless, It’s still a commonality that’s worth pointing out, I think.

Just as an aside, I’d like to take this opportunity to give a shoutout to cousin Kyle’s version of Human Kite. Everything about him is an egregious Jewish caricature, from his irritating, snivelling voice to his long list of health issues. It’s not my fault that the limited Jewish gene pool has fucked me over, Tratt! Leave me alone! A meta about antisemitism within Cousin’s Kyle characterisation would be a mile long, so I’ll spare you that for now.

Anyway, what does this all mean when we’re creating fan content around TFBW? Must we just chuck the Human Kite persona into a blender and never speak of it again? Not necessarily. Speaking as a Jewish fandom member, I quite enjoy reading and writing Human Kite. It’s a fun character to play around with! Despite his unfortunate roots, I don’t believe including him is innately antisemitic. It just depends on how you go about doing it! If he’s not secretly running the world, controlling the banks and Hollywood, or consuming the blood of innocent Christians, you’re on the right track. 

You could even go for a little meta-commentary and acknowledge the antisemitic coding within the text! Here’s an example of how I did that in my upcoming TFBW reality swap fic (don’t question why there’s two of everyone, it makes sense within the text lmao)

“Wait, you’re telling me in an alternate reality we’re all aliens?” Kyle gawks at this funhouse-mirror version of himself, who’s busy gawking right back. “No, Kyle, just—just you,” Kenny says. “Oh.” Kyle narrows his eyes. “You know, it’s difficult not to interpret this with antisemitic undertones.” “What, like the Jewish Space Laser conspiracy?” Cartman asks. Mysterion frowns. “Jewish people have space lasers in your universe?” “No,” Cartman sighs and shakes his head forlornly, before muttering, “it’s a made-up rumour to perpetuate mistrust and hatred towards the Jewish community.” “Alright, don’t sound so disappointed,” Kyle huffs. “Guys!” Stan says. “Can we not start this argument again?” “I never said it was a cool rumour, Kyle!” Cartman snaps defensively. “Obviously it’s super harmful and whatever. All I meant was that it would have been cool if it were real. Because, like, space lasers are awesome! Right?” He looks to Kite, apparently presuming that they’re an authority on the matter. “Um.” Kite blinks, then says hesitantly, “I can shoot lasers… from my eyes. And once I did sort of fly up into space and magnify the lasers to destroy Chaos’s tin foil factory. So, uh. Does that help?” Cartman’s face lights up and is split in half by an enthusiastic grin. “It helps a lot, actually.” Kyle groans and pinches his nose. “You have no idea how much education you’ve just undone, dude.” He opens his eyes to glower at Kite. Kenny glances at Chaos. “Tin foil factory?” Chaos waves a hand dismissively. “Outsourcing proved more efficient.”

There we go! A lighthearted little nod, which acknowledges potential antisemitic readings of Human Kite, without justifying or excusing it. It’s not at all necessary when creating fan content around Human Kite, but just know that that’s an option to you, if you so choose. Just make sure antisemites are the butt of your joke, and not Jewish people, lmao.

I’ll finish up by returning to my general sentiment that I held in my Vamp!Kyle post. If you conduct your creations with a basic level of awareness and self-reflection, you’ll probably be alright. Just stay in the know, and you’re all good to go 😎

[kick-a-long]

My take on Attack on Titan is pretty conflicting. On one hand, as you said, it's classic Holocaust/WW2 inversion. I have a deep feeling that the creator Isayama took a basic knowledge of antisemitism (i.e. the armbands) and applied it to the story. My issue lies in the fact that he never once mentioned that antisemitism inspired his story (I've searched high and low and apparently he pointed to WW2 a few times but that's it...) and I find it very despicable to use Jews as inspiration and never mention us once (unless I missed something but idk). I can't shake off the feeling that he probably used his little knowledge about us and expanded on it using his own mind only to use more antisemitic tropes without even realizing. Now the guy's smart and I'm not trying to say he's dumb or infantalize him but gentiles are very ignorant of us, even when they learn about the Holocaust/WW2, they have a hard time understanding us and knowing about us tbh. I'm pretty confused also because an important point of the story is the Eldians being referred to as "the children of the devil" which is so specific to Jews but he never mentioned us ONCE when speaking about influences/inspirations so I have no clue where his knowledge of us lies. Which isn't a good thing.

Attack on Titan is perfect when it comes to showcasing antisemitism and it frustrates the fuck out of me because here you have the Eldians which are a very great depiction of Jews imo (he may not have mentioned us but it's so blatant that we are the inspiration, it's impossible to miss) and yet 1) it's most likely done on accident by some random gentile who never gave us credit and 2) writing choices/mistakes put it in antisemitic territory. The fact that we didn't create this is mind boggling.

I'm a huge fan of aot even with all its flaws and I actually wrote something insanely long pointing of the similarities of "Eldian oppression" with antisemitism and how Eldians are clearly an alternate version of us. I searched everywhere and somehow no one wrote anything making a (decent) comparison. People hate when real life stuff gets compared to fiction and I get it but the case here is that we are the main inspirations so I personally enjoy examining the similarities.

Now one of the issues I've seen be raised about Eldians clearly being Jews is that: Eldians used to rule the world, they colonized and oppressed everyone so that's the reason everyone hates them. This is obviously not good to pair with the fact that Jews are the inspiration here. I'm conflicted because Isayama's vague/weird writing here makes people believe this is the case but as someone who read the manga a million times, I believe it's supposed to be vague because you're supposed to question if this is even true. I think you're supposed to think "maybe this is false and everyone is lying and rewriting history to hate and oppress the Eldians who just scare them with their powers". There's also the fact that Eldia wasn't the only empire and the Marleyan empire (Marley is the main power house of the world) also did heinous things just like Eldia's accused of and I think this is supposed to get you to think real hard. Either way, it gets into antisemitic territory for sure. But in my paper I wrote, this mimics another feature of antisemitism: the rewriting of history which we have to deal with so they can justify oppressing and hating us and the intellectualization of antisemitism. I gave so many examples.

I think aot perfectly highlights the pure insanity of antisemitism honestly. It showcases how cartoonishly evil it is.

Off topic but this paper I did for fun made me extra frustrated because why are we held to such an impossible standard?! I've also studied other movements by minorities wanting to be liberated and to uplift themselves and just like Zionism, these movements have their good and bad and yet only Zionism gets all the criticism. It's so unfair wtf. I know Zionism has caused more harm in comparison (but those movements are not criticised at all, unless it's by a right winger..) and it deserves criticism for that but so did Communism (which is antisemitic and I call that shit out but I personally understand the reason for Communism's existence and respect that it's going to continue to exist). Once again we are the prototype and they're testing the waters of what's "socially acceptable" to say about minorities by using us as the test dummies!

Okay I'll stop now because I will just keep going haha

I feel similarly. i think i don't like labeling it as antisemitic because antisemitism is centered around jews and has an active and obsessive element that other bigorty doesn't. AoT has a total absence of jews but has used jewish narratives about antisemitism second and third hand to push Japanese nationalism. I guess it's hard for me because I don't consider jewish erasure to be antisemitism as I know it even if it's a big part of anti jewish bigotry. if that makes sense? it's not even intentional jewish erasure in my opinion because it treats antisemitism as a universal thing, which it isn't. i think they, like many people, think antisemitism started with ww2 and ended with it. also that it came out of thin air, that antisemites are good people who are mislead instead of intentionally spreading lies to justify the underlying prejudice ingrained in their culture. it gets the cause and effect backwards.

my reasons for thinking the japanese don't understand jews as separate from all europeans or americans or the shit jews face as being a historic recurring thing is that they are one of only a handful of countries that never had a sizable population of jews, muslims, or christians. and even if someone is buddist or atheist there they usually still follow folk religion traditions.

so it's definitely full of anti jewish bigotry but with no relationship to any established antisemitic theory.

[princessbettina]

Tulips 🌷Walter Deville x Fem!Reader-The Invitation

Summary: You go about your day each week, doing the things in which you enjoy (garden work outside in the garden you own in the cottage house you have) and even taking care of the mini farm in which you have that’s located across your cottage home) when one day, he sees you from a little bit away, he can’t take his eyes off you, that’s when he becomes your new secret admirer. He (aka Walter Deville) starts leaving little gifts for you in your garden that you take note of and one day, the time you and Walter meet brings a few surprises that you certainly didn’t expect in your life.

(A/N: This was originally going to be writen as a Female OC character paired with Walter story, but I changed my mind and thought writing it as y/n reader paired with Walter looked better. Y/N is the main female lead in this.

Also, there's a lot of use of the words "darling" and "my love" included in this. Mini warning as it gets a little intense towards the middle, but nothing spicy or violent happens.

This is similar to @bi-bard 's work on here. After reading her's, I got inspired to write my own version, or something similar. I love the one she wrote!

By no means, is this a remake or copy of her's. The one I wrote is inspired by the one she wrote.

I aplogize if there are any grammar or spelling mistakes in this.

I hope you all enjoy <3)

🌷

It was always bright and sunny. No rain or cloud ever filled the sky, and when it did it was still peaceful to say the least. Each day of every week was pretty much the same. I would go to school, theatre school that is, then to work, and finally back home to my lovely cottage home. With everyday being beautiful outdoors, I took the opportunity to continue my garden work, which I became very passionate about.

My garden was filled with mainly flowers. From sunflowers to roses that perfectly lined up in a delicate row as one all around the garden.

A few steps away from my garden was my mini farm that did in fact have a couple animals living in it. A golden baby chick that was always waddling around, one pretty pink piglet, and a goose with fur white as snow.

Those animals were almost like my children. I adored taking care of them. That is exactly what I did every day when I came home from a busy day out each week.

🌷

It was a new week when I had come back home from being at school and then work. I stepped outside to water the flowers in the garden when I began to feel as though I was being watched.

“I’m feeling someone’s presence, but there’s literally no one around me” I thought to myself, furrowing my eyebrows as I quickly glanced all around and behind me and even straight ahead, outside the wooden gate that separated my home from the other half, that lead to the hills and empty fields that lead to more beautiful emptiness in the cottage atmosphere in which I was in.

Not thinking much of it, I shook it off, shaking my head briefly and then returned to my garden work and then headed over to my farm to greet my lovely animal friends.

Unbeknownst to me, as I was walking to the farm, that’s when the same presence recurred again. A little ways away from the farm and my house, there he was. Kneeling down and hiding behind a tree that was next to the cobblestone filled pathway that anyone could walk on, passing through the neighborhood.

He studied my every move from when I glided out of my garden and over to my farm and then walked into it. I had no clue there was a person there.

The person who hid behind the tree liked what he was seeing and wanted to get to know me, but he didn’t exactly know how to make the move and strike up a conversation with me. A sudden idea came to his mind and quickly disappeared to wherever he lived, knowing just what to do to get my attention, hopefully.

🌷

The next day rolled around and as soon as I got home and into my garden, I noticed something that wasn’t there before. Moving closer to it, I raised my eyebrow from curiosity when I saw a small golden key that looked like it could open a door, with a few tulips attached to it. I gently picked up the key and tulips and examined it for a few minutes in my hands.

“Why is there a key with tulips attached to it? This is difficult to understand" I asked myself.

Shrugging it off again, I walked back inside to my cottage home where I gently unwrapped the tulips from the key and placed them in a vase filled with water, letting them grow and show off their beauty in the inside of my home.

"Wow, that actually is really pretty." I thought to myself as I examined the tulips in the vase that was sitting atop my dining room table.

The day was finished and soon another began. I opened my door and glanced down and saw a small pile of tulips waiting for me to take them in.

I widened my eyes and covered my mouth with my hand as I quickly knelt down to pick up the flowers.

"What is happening here? This is starting to become creepy." I whispered to myself as I glanced down at the flowers quickly before looking around to see if someone nearby would confess that they sent the flowers.

No one was around. Great!

Quickly, I put the new set of flowers in the same vase with the first three and then headed to school and work for the day.

"It could be a quick mistake that the mailman made. Mix Ups in delivery are a common mistake that are easily fixable. Yes! That's gotta be it" I thought to myself while being at school.

This mysterious tulip situation was all that I could think about and focus on.

Nothing else. This was becoming an overwhelming distraction that I needed to stop thinking about.

I had to either find out who's behind this or put an end to it soon.

Hopefully the mysterious person would confess sooner rather than later.

🌷

It was when I got home for the night when I noticed yet another thing that caught my eye right on the steps of my home.

Reaching my front steps, I knelt down and picked up this letter and with it were more tulips. Of course.

Furrowing my eyebrows in slight confusion as I began to read and try to understand the letter in which it read the following, "Greetings Y/N, you are cordially invited to the New Carfax Abbey manor to meet Walter Deville, the lord of the manor. He has taken an interest in meeting you. If you accept, the meeting is scheduled for tomorrow. Transportation will be provided. Best wishes.

P.s. bring the gold key"

I shook my head in slight disbelief. How was all of this happening so fast? I felt a sudden thrill because I knew I would soon find out and meet the one who sent the tulips. Whoever this Walter person is.

I couldn't help but giggle when the letter mentioned bringing the key, "I was wondering what the key was about."

I went inside and then proceeded to do my fun hobbies outdoors and took care of my animal friends.

🌷

The day in which I had been waiting for had arrived. I looked out my window, pacing back and forth, kind of impatiently as I waited for my source of transportation. Whatever vehicle it would be.

Holding the gold key in my hands, a sudden knock on my front door was heard. I gasped softly and quickly scurried to the door and opened it and saw an older man standing a few feet away from my door.

"Are you miss Y/N, L/N?" The older man asked in a neutral, calm tone of voice and emotion.

"Yes, that is me, in the flesh. Are you Walter Deville?" I questioned quickly as the older man shook his head briefly.

"No. I'm the butler of the manor. You can call me Mr. Field. I've worked with Walter for many years." Mr. Field introduced briefly.

I nodded slightly.

"Come along now. Walter is expecting your arrival and wouldn't want to keep him waiting too much longer." Waved Mr.Field as he turned around and walked back to the black old fashioned Cadillac.

I quickly locked up my home and then followed suit to the car, thanking Mr. Field as he held open the car door for me as I got in.

Moments later, the drive to the manor began. My eyes loved and enjoyed the outdoor sights as we got closer to the manor. My heart beamed with excitement as we passed a few flower gardens that stood out in the green grassy open fields.

I got so wrapped up in the excitement of the flowers that I didn't realize we had arrived at the manor. Mr. Field helped escort me out of the car and seconds later, I found myself in awe while looking up at the manor that I stood before.

"Wow. This place is incredible" I whispered to myself, while admiring its beauty and mysteriousness for as much as I could before my thoughts of admiration were interrupted.

"Miss Y/N, I introduce to you the lord of the manor, Walter Deville." Announced Mr. Field as he motioned an arm to the man who walked down the steps and over to me with smooth, delicate, and quick steps who just so happened to be Walter Deville himself.

Walter was definitely not who I expected, but it was a pleasant surprise to say the least. "Thank you, Mr. Field for the introduction. I'll take it from here." Walter kindly said to Mr. Field as he quickly nodded his head and bowed and scurried away, leaving it to just be Walter and I.

"You must be Y/N? It's an honor to finally meet you" Said Walter as he smiled brightly. I smiled back, trying not to blush.

"That's me. It's nice to meet you too, Walter"

"Oh, please you can call me Walt, dear" Walt winked and smiled more. I widened my eyes and nodded. "Oh, why of course. It's nice to meet you, Walt"

Him and I smiled at each other for a few seconds more, the blush and heat growing on my face more and more. Walt then held out his arm and motioned for me to take his arm in mine, "Come along, dear. I think it's appropriate to show you a tour of the manor. I think you'll love it"

I smiled and wrapped my arm into his and followed his lead as we made it into the manor. The manor was even more breathtaking on the inside as well on the outside. Classic works of art or paintings that looked like art were displayed perfectly all throughout the manor.

Followed by this was a large beautiful cobblestone grand staircase that I found myself barely having time to really admire as I found Walt guiding me up the staircase and through a pathway that led to different rooms.

Walt showed me every room possible, from the kitchen to the grand library, which I thought was incredible.

As we were walking through the large open hallways, Walt glanced down at me and smiled softly, "I would be honored if you told me about yourself."

Glancing up at him, I smiled too and then gently shook my head, leaning it forward just a bit, "Oh okay. Uhmm, what would you like to know?"

"Anything. What do you enjoy doing for fun? Hobbies of any sort?" Walt replied, wiggling his eyebrows slightly as he continued to look at me.

I giggled and blushed, looking away from him briefly to relax my face. "Well, I enjoy performing, you know acting in plays, becoming characters that you normally would never be in reality." I firstly mentioned, looking back over at Walt as he remained quiet but was eager for me to continue talking.

"I guess I've always had a strong passion for performing ever since I was younger and being in my first play in school, Really helped set that goal for me. I should also mention that being outdoors, gardening in particular. I've always enjoyed planting flowers ever since I was child. It's another passion of mine if you will" I smiled more as I finished my long answer about myself.

Walt smiled as he nodded his head, showing me that he was listening. "Lovely answers, darling. It's refreshing to see those passions within you. Speaking of gardens, if you look out this window you'll see the manor garden out there. Please feel free to use it any time you wish."

My smile grew and grew as the excitement in me increased. I was becoming more and more speechless.

"I can assure you that there are plenty of tulips in the garden waiting for you, darling" Said Walt, with another charming wink my way.

I widened my eyes and gasped softly after putting the pieces of the days and even weeks before together. With the mysterious gold key to the tulips always showing up at my house.

Walt was the one who sent them.

"H-how did you know? Wait, you were the one who sent them? You sent the tulips, didn't you?" I asked, raising my eyebrow slightly.

Walt chuckled once more and nodded, "You are absolutely right, darling. I did send you those things."

"I honestly never would have guessed. But why did you send them, Walt?" I asked softly as I gently crossed my arms in a neutral way, staring back at Walt.

"I happened to be in your neighborhood and let's just say that you caught my eye but I didn't know how to talk to you before that, so sending the tulips was my way of communicating. I knew you'd like them. Any flower really. You can say that I was your secret admirer" Said Walt, smiling even more brightly than before.

How was any of the things I'm hearing coming out of his mouth possible? My mind couldn't comprehend the fact that I did in fact have a first secret admirer. Growing up, that was something I struggled with not having. I wasn't the type that people crushed on or liked me back if I felt that way towards them.

Learning to accept that fact was indeed a hard pill to swallow, but over time, I got used to it. Knowing that Walt (maybe) had a crush on me, sent shock waves all through my body of adrenaline.

🌷

On the next (last) stop in our tour, I found myself raising my eyebrow in slight confusion as Walt and I stood in front of a door in which I had no clue as to what was behind it.

Walt turned around and glanced at me for a second, taking both my hands into his, "May I have the key please, darling?" He kindly asked while pursing his lips slightly that fell into a smirk.

Getting lost in his beautiful and mysterious expressions and features, I nodded quickly while stumbling out for words. I removed one of my hands from his briefly to retrieve the key that was in my pocket.

After handing it to him, he let go of my hand to turn and face the door as he inserted the key into the door in which it just so happened to unlock the room.

Brilliant.

Walt quickly glanced at me once more while unlocking the door, smirking that instantly caused me to blush. I giggled and my eyes fell to the ground for a moment, then back up when Walt held the door open for me, leading me inside.

The room was pitch black for a few moments, which caused me to furrow my eyebrows and my heart rate to increase slightly because I could'nt see a thing, that's how dark it was, "What is this place, Walt?" I asked out loud, hoping Walt would respond.

"You'll see, darling." Walt replied with a small giggle. A faint whooshing noise was heard and suddenly there was light in the entire room which revealed what the room was.

Seeing the audience chairs and large stage took my breath away. I knew exactly where we were, what this room was as I instantly loved it. I couldn't help but smile.

"Do you like it?" Walt asked softly, smiling at me. I quickly nodded and continued to smile back at him.

"Yes. Yes I do. It's magnificent. You have an auditorium fit for performers like me and fit for hosting performances in your mansion"

Walt chuckled at my reaction, "I had a strong feeling you might be pleased with it. You are always more than welcome to use it anytime, darling"

I smiled at the sound of that. A silence was heard for a few brief moments, until I heard Walt begin to speak again.

"What drew you to performing?"

I looked up at him and smiled, as my mind raced quickly to think of an answer that wouldn't sound boring or repetitive to him. "Oh uhmm, I guess ever since being in grade school and taking the drama classes there and being in the drama club really sparked my interest. Being on that stage alongside my friends as we pretended to be characters that we're usually not was a lot of fun for me." I said softly while smiling, my heart began to race, hoping that I didn't say too much to Walt.

He smiled and nodded his head while still looking at me, "Good answer. I think it brought a lot of happiness to your friends that you feel that way."

I nodded too while chuckling. "You're too kind. I really appreciate that, Walt."

"This auditorium, along with the garden is yours, darling. Everything in the manor here is yours. I hope I'll someday get to see you perform." Stated Walt as he playfully smirked again, causing me to blush uncontrollably.

"Perhaps you could even teach me how to perform." Walt suggested, which made me furrow my eyebrows in a playful way as a giggle escaped my lips.

"You really want acting lessons from me? I mean, I could give it a try,but I'm not an acting coach" I giggled playfully while clasping my hands together while looking at Walt.

"You and I just met, taking lessons from a complete stranger isn't ideal. Besides I don't think I'm very good at performing anyway" I admitted, slowly turning my head away from him for a second.

Walt shook his head in disagreement, "I don't think that's true. Give it time, I'm sure you'll feel like you and I have known each other a lot longer. You shouldn't doubt yourself on something you're passionate about. Please for me?" Walt said with softness in his voice.

I turned back to face him and blushed after hearing everything he just told me. I had no idea what to say. I glanced down at the floor for a moment, then back at Walt.

"I think that can be arranged, Walt. But I am curious though, why do you have this beautifully built performing auditorium if you don't use it?" I asked curiously. Walt pursed his lips playfully again.

"If you can believe this, when I was child, I too was a big fan of the arts. That goes for all art forms like painting, pottery, musical, and theatre. There was one instance where I found myself standing on a stage alone like this one here," Walt motioned over to the stage that was a few steps away from us.

"There was no crowd but seeing the empty chairs and imagining what an actual crowd of people would be like for me made me fascinated in that art form. Unfortunately, I knew I wasn't good at performing, my skills weren't there. I know yours are though, that's why I want you to teach me, darling" Said Walt, as he gently grabbed hold of my hands and led me to the middle of the stage, where he and I leaned against, standing next to one another.

Hearing everything that Walt said made my heart flutter. I think I was starting to fall more for Walt. I hope he will be there to catch me when I make my final leap.

"All of what you said is extremely heartwarming, Walt. I want to teach you, but we still literally met today. Wouldn't you want to get to know me for a bit longer? You know, for a few more days at least?" I asked while fiddling with my fingers as Walt chuckled softly.

"Within these few hours of spending with you has made me already feel like we both know each other. Can't you feel the connection, darling?" He asked in a soft tone while slowly leaning towards me.

I could start to feel my face start to burn from blush when he got closer to me. All I could do was nod my head, my mind was spinning. What was Walt doing? Was what I thought going to happen next?

"Y-yes I think I'm starting to feel it, Walt. I think I've come to the conclusion that you're really great." I smiled as my eyes glanced down at the ground for a second. My eyes picked back up when I felt Walt's hands gently on top of my cheeks, causing me to blush once more.

"I also think you're really great too, darling." Walt softly replied as his hands gently caressed my face, his thumb gently rubbed against one part of my face, causing my heart to beat extremely fast.

Walt kept leaning forward, the tips of our noses touched as his lips were centimeters away from mine. "May I kiss you, darling?" He asked softly. I nodded my head and felt my heart want to leap out of my chest.

"Yes" I quickly whispered. Walt closed his eyes and gently pressed his lips to mine, kissing me which I had never ever experienced before. I wanted this magical feeling to last for as long as possible. This wasn't what I expected to feel as my first kiss, but it was one that I was head over heels for, instantly loving it, trying to hold onto the feeling forever.

As the kiss deepened, Walt had gently rested his hand atop of my arm when I felt what felt like him poking and pinching my arm and the skin around it. I gently pulled away from the kiss and gasped softly after feeling the pinching.

"Hey? What was that for?" I hissed while grabbing hold of my upper arm and then furrowed my eyebrows up at Walt.

"I am so sorry, my love. I didn't mean to do that on purpose. I guess I got too ahead of myself there." He admitted with a slight chuckle. His hands were holding mine briefly.

Taking one of his hands, I lifted it up and examined it as my eyes widened when I saw and studied these bright red monster-like claws that took over his human fingernails. What was going on here?

I furrowed my eyebrows once more up at Walt as I still held his hand, "W-what are these, Walt?"

Walt took a deep breath as he looked straight into my eyes, "Now, my love please believe me when I say it's nothing to worry about. Not even to be afraid of either. I can reassure you that I will never use them to hurt you in any way." His hand is still holding mine.

I tried slowly backing out of his grasp but he didn't budge. Acknowledging my attempt to escape, Walt remained calm as his thumb rubbed against the top of my wrist, hoping that would calm me down.

Of course it did.

🌷

I would have fought more but I had no idea what Walt was capable of and I really didn't want to get on his bad side. Taking a few deep breaths as I relaxed in his touch. My mind began to spin again. I had no idea what to think of it all.

My body was filling up with both fear and adrenaline, like heavy waves of water crashing along the shore rapidly.

"Are you afraid, my love?" Walt asked quietly. I glanced up at him while shaking my head, "I'm not afraid. Of course not."

Walt gently let go of my hand, which allowed me to pull back and hold on it with my other hand, near my chest.

"Y/n" Walt began with a calm but stern tone while walking to the other side of me and the stage.

"I can sense a little bit of fear in you. You don't have anything to fear, I am not going to hurt you. You are going to be just fine with me, under my protection, darling."

There was a slight pause, I was still trying to understand it all. Nothing was ringing any familiar bell in my brain. Walt and I locked eyes with one another, "What are you?" I asked in a soft whisper.

Walt leaned towards me for a moment while smirking, and that's when I could feel the heat grow on my face just a little bit again, the same as before the secrets were revealed.

"Why don't I just show you,darling." Walt quickly replied and smirked a little bit more for a moment, which then turned into him opening his mouth, revealing and showing his two pointed and sharp vampire fangs.

The heat on my face grew when my eyes saw his fangs. I covered my mouth with my hand for a brief moment.

"Y-you're a vampire?" I asked in a soft tone. Walt smirked again while closing his mouth and nodded.

My whole life I've always been fascinated with the concept of vampires. But that was always in stories and films. I was told that vampires don't exist.

Man, was I wrong! But I think it's horrifyingly cool in reality.

🌷

"My love, you're a part of the family now. I strongly believe that one day, very soon, you'll be a vampire like me, too." Asserted Walt as he gently held my hands once more. I widened my eyes and was taken back by the powerful statement he said.

"I'm sorry what? Me, be a vampire like you?" I questioned, furrowing my eyebrows up at Walt as he simply nodded at me once more.

I shook my head in disapproval, "I think this is all amazing and breathtaking, Walt but I don't think I have what it takes to be a vampire. I'm so sorry." I pulled my hands away from him and began to walk towards the auditorium doors. Walt stood where he was, watching me walk away with slight worry in his eyes.

I only made it inches away from fully exiting when I was stopped right in front of Mr. Field. "Oh, hi again Mr. Field. Would it be alright if you took me home now?" I asked, hoping he would follow through.

Mr. Field shook his head, "Apologizes Miss Y/n, but I am unable to do that request."

I closed my eyes and brought my hands to my chest, fighting back and holding back my tears that I felt forming in my eyes. I slowly turned back around to see Walt, but he was gone.

I didn't hear or see him leave. This was confusing. Furrowing my eyebrows at the empty spot in which Walt stood once before, I quickly turned my head and body back towards the door, attempting to leave the auditorium when I gasped loudly.

"My love,please don't leave. This is your home now. I promise you my full protection. You are completely safe with me. I will not hurt you." Walt softly assured me as he magically appeared right in front of me, resting his hands on my arms that were held in front of me, fighting to not get too close to him.

"Please just listen to me. Please, darling" Walt cried out, getting me to stop and stand still, taking deep breaths as I looked into his eyes. He rested his hand atop of my shoulder.

"What about my home? My school and work? I have a family who I care about very much. I need to go back to them sometime soon" I questioned softly. My heart and mind burned while awaiting his response.

"Your family can visit you anytime. You don't have to say goodbye to them, darling. You don't have to say goodbye to that life. Everything will remain the same." Said Walt, reassuring me again. He began rubbing my shoulder with his thumb briefly.

🌷

I closed my eyes once more and felt a few tears start to fall down my cheeks. I was totally overwhelmed by everything I was being told. I wanted to go through it, but I was terrified of the whole transformation process.

"Hey, hey, hey. Y/n, it's okay. You're safe with me." Walt softly spoke against my ear and planted a kiss on my cheek.

His kiss on my cheek began to sooth my scared emotions down. I blushed as his lips remained on my cheek for a few brief moments, "I am being totally truthful and honest with you, my love. Please believe me. I wanted to tell you right away, instead of keeping it a secret and having you find out on your own." Walt admitted as he kissed my cheek once more before gently holding my chin with the tips of his fingers.

I continued to take deep breaths and nodded my head. I guess this is a childhood dream come true for me. Meeting a real vampire,falling in love with him, and becoming a vampire myself has always fascinated me.

What? It's true! Haha

All in all, I don't care about the secrets of what Walt is and what lies within the manor. All I truly care about is Walt and being with him everyday, and being under his wing.

I glanced up and into Walt's eyes as he looked into mine, a small smile began to show upon my face, "Walt. I thought about it and I changed my mind. I think being alongside you and being a vampire is okay to me. It's not so bad anymore. I'll stay, I promise."

Walt smiled brightly after hearing what I told him, "Yes? You will? That's wonderful, love. Thank you!" He pulled me in for a warm hug as I hugged him back, resting my head on his shoulder and blushed when I felt his lips kiss my neck gently.

From this happy and romantic time, Walt politely waved Mr. Field off, allowing him to leave and go about his business. He did just that, bowing before Walt and I and then exiting out of the auditorium.

"You are in complete and safe hands with me, like I previously mentioned. Oh and welcome home, my love." Said Walt as he winked my way, causing me to blush again. He then magically held out a tulip that he held behind his back and handed it to me.

I smiled and giggled softly as I took the tulip from him and thanked him for it by giving him a kiss on his cheek.

I swear I saw a tint of blush appear on his face that made my heart flutter with excitement. Oh what a thrilling time to be alive!

-the end!

I hope you all enjoyed my very first Walter 'Walt' Deville fanfic! It was tons of fun to write. There will be more of Walt to come from me soon, I promise! <3

[superman86to99]

A Wrong Righted! (A Baldy Award Tale)

by Don Sparrow

We don't often talk about the letter columns on the blog, but a feature of the letter columns from 1990 to 2001 was that one letter per issue that was deemed interesting, or who brought up a good point, or answered a trivia question correctly would be "awarded" a Baldy award.  In the DC universe narrative, the Baldy award was a nickname for Zenith Awards Banquet for Integrity in Journalism, which is hosted by noted bald headed man, Lex Luthor (as Max noted in his write up for Superman #44) but in the letter columns, it was similar to Marvel's "no-prize" prize, just kind of a neat little shout out you got for having a good letter. Or so I thought, until I started reading this blog.  I had always thought it was just a phantom shout out, for bragging rights only, at least as a kid.

There weren't a lot of rules regarding the Baldy award, but the big one I noticed over the years is that you couldn't get one if you asked for it--it had to be given unbidden.

Over the years as I'd read Superman comics cover to cover, I would pore over the letter columns, wishing that someday I'd earn a Baldy award.  This was a tough feat, as my collecting was piecemeal, and I'd often get the latest issue months after it was released, so even if I got it together to send a letter, it was well beyond the four issue gap they seemed to have.

It wasn't until college that reaching out to the Super titles became a little easier--in one issue they revealed the e-mail to which you could send fan letters, or sometimes they'd even publish comments directly from the DC Comics Message Boards.  I found that if you commented early enough, or wrote them right on release day, your chances were pretty good of getting published.  

The first letter I ever got published in a Superman comic came in Action Comics #770, in the year 2000, which was part of the "Emperor Joker" storyline.  Four issues previously, in Action Comics #766, the letter column asked what was the last time that Santa Claus appeared on a cover.  I quickly went to my long boxes to find the issue where Bibbo appeared as Santa Claus, Adventures of Superman #487.  (In that review, we actually tell a version of this story again, but now it has an ending!) and said so in my e-mailed fan letter.  When I bought my copy of Action Comics #770, I was shocked to find my own name in print, and even more shocked to have been awarded a Baldy for my Superman trivia knowledge.  I was thrilled to have the issue, fully believing that the Baldy Award was like the Marvel no-prize, and that being in print was "reward" enough. It wasn't until years later, reading this very blog that I realized that other winners had been sent a real physical postcard, bearing Eric Peterson's stunning (and Trumpian by design) portrait of Lex Luthor from his in-universe biography (and DC one shot).  While I would have cherished such a memento, I didn't feel too upset about it since it was all so many years ago, and, as discussed on the other post, the letter column was answered in-character by the Joker, so perhaps it was even intentional that they didn't send one out, as a Joker like prank (in fact, it's probably a lot safe for the Joker to not have my home address to send stuff to!).  

Cut to a few weeks ago, when I received a strange e-mail, asking if I was the Don Sparrow from Saskatoon who won a Baldy in 2000 (which I was!), inviting me to a private Facebook group, made up only of Baldy Award winners.  I joined the group, and was astonished to see they had a post with my name on it commemorating my Baldy win.  I made a comment on the page thanking them for my inclusion, adding that I didn't know back in 2000 that they even gave out physical awards, but that I was thrilled all the same to have won a Baldy.  There was some indignation on my behalf (again--I really didn't mind, not really knowing at the time what I had missed!), and someone on the thread tagged Mike Carlin, the legendary editor, jokingly or not-so-jokingly demanding to know why he had neglected to send mine (and a few others who had missed out) the award. I expressed again that I hadn't minded that I didn't win a postcard, but all the same, the wonderful Mike Carlin, architect of my favourite era of storytelling of my favourite fictional character, sent me a private message asking for my home address, which I gave him promptly.  Did I dare dream what this meant?  

Sure enough, only a week or so later, landing in my mailbox like a rocket in a farmer's field was a Baldy Award.  Beautiful, handwritten, and only 24 years late, but in my hands, as it was always intended to be. 

I messaged Mike to thank him, and am proud to share that you can consider this 24 year old wrong righted! 

[Max: I am insanely jealous, but also impressed that Mr. Carlin still has a stack of Baldys to give out in these occasions. Unrelated: ICYMI, we posted about the final chapters of the "Worlds Collide" crossover the other day!]

[freebooter4ever]

does anyone else have tropes in their own writing that would only make sense to them? if you've ever read multiple fics of mine and come across any background character named 'janet' or any character whose name starts with a 'j' or is similar to that - those are all the same character. Its this weird obsession of mine - to put real life people into my fanfic. And each 'janet' is a new version of my great aunt janet who was, to put it kindly, a holy terror. She was mean to everyone, she hated children (though she tolerated me because i silently did everything she told me to and would help her shell peas on the farm when we visited), and she died old and alone. But her life was pretty sad too - she grew up when women weren't educated much, and she never married and instead of living her own life was left by her older brothers as the caretaker of their mother, basically until the day she died. So in my stories all my 'janet's lead beautifully full and happy lives with lots of friends. None of the main plots are about janet, obviously, but if i need a side character i just plop her in there and invent a better life for her than the one she was stuck with.

I do this with grandma too. If there's a random little old lady in my fic it's probably based on grandma. The most popular being Eleanor from DOA. I even wrote a short story about an old woman who knits and spins her own yarn, and pricks her finger on the spinning wheel to become a superhero and save her suburbs from aliens, but instead of fighting the aliens ends up befriending them and adopts them as a sort of alien cat breed. It was entirely based on grandma jojo, who -if you think my insecurities are bad - is even worse when it comes to believing she can do anything. She doesn't think she can do anything right, so she never wants to do anything because she knows she won't do it well. This baffled grandpa jojo, who used to try to teach her about airplanes and rockets and wanted her to go to college. And this equally baffled me my whole life - when i was really little i apparently wouldnt let her just sit beside me, i made her draw too. So all my stories feature larger than life superhero grandma characters.

And lavender - this is one people have caught me on, lol. Because I use it every chance I get. Grandma callyerdogsoff was a poet and an artist herself, but writing her into stories as a character feels impossible. So instead i use her signature scent. She died in 2010 but sometimes if i think about her i can still smell lavender.

People belittle fangirls, fanfic, and fanartists and say this stuff isn't worth anything compared to 'real' creative work but. I dunno. There's so much more to it than people imagine. I know none of my writing will last beyond my lifetime, and that none of these little tropes will be teased out of it like in english lit class. So whats the harm in writing within already built communities that share an established passion? My 'original' work always feels lonelier than the stuff written with an audience in mind. Why is writing my original work so much better when it just sits there and is never seen by anybody other than me. Compared to the fanfic where im writing my stories about other people's characters and using my words and my particular quirks...and usually interacting with a whole community of friends and fellow writers.

[lilolilyr]

I have an idea for an Andromaquynh modern AU fanfic

In it, Quynh moves back home to her parents after getting a degree at university she isn't really sure she can or wants to use. She used to think that she's a city girl despising the suburbs she grew up in, but now she thinks she was wrong about that or maybe her preferences changed, she doesn't much like the cities she studied in anymore, first she thinks it's because she studied abroad (in the countries of her ancestors) and could never quite connect to the culture there, but visiting a friend in a city in her home country shows her it isn't just that, she just prefers a quieter environment

In the meantime, her parents have moved to a different part of town and it doesn't really feel like coming home at all. Quynh still struggles with her place in life, she doesn't want to hang around on her parents' couch doing nothing forever but she doesn't know what else to do either and the thought of a regular 9-5 job in an office terrifies her, she has done enough internships in that kind of environment to know she can't stand it for long

Quynh starts taking long walks through the countryside, for her health because she hasn't really found any sports/active hobbies in the area yet (that's an aspect she really liked about the cities, there's always something interesting going on, she used to dance and try out things like shooting with bow&arrow and axe throwing), and to have quiet time to think away from her family. That way she gets to know the area quite well - she actually already knows it a bit because she really didn't live far away as a kid, but she never really walked through the fields on this side of the suburbs before

On her walks she sometimes comes across equestrians, and one time a horse throws off its rider and she ends up catching the animal, which doesn't seem to mind people in general just people trying to climb and sit on it - it won't stay the last time she comes across that particular animal, and she thinks she understands the horse quite well what with not wanting to do jobs they don't like just to be allowed to live comfortably.

Andy's the owner of the horse riding school, and when a girl falls off her horse (probably the one that doesn't much like its riders, Quynh calls it Big Guy lovingly not knowing what it's actually called) and needs medical attention, Quynh ends up taking the horse back to the stables and meets Andy there.

There's a bit of an age-gap between them and even once they meet and fall in love Andy is reluctant to commit to Quynh out of fear of tying Quynh to a life she might not really want, meanwhile Quynh is finally figuring out her place in life and she wants to stay with Andy.

I'll probably never write the full fanfic, I just don't have the time and motivation for it. If anyone's interested in getting the draft and adopting it, I'd love to hand it over for you to write it!

Post is okay to reblog :)

The draft I have is pretty much in bullet points atm, but I'd even go over it and clean it up a bit if someone's really interested in adopting the fic, and I'd be open to either chatting about it and giving more input, or you taking it and doing your own thing with it!

I don't have the time to write a longfic atm and I feel like what with the plot I'm thinking of, it really needs to be 10 or even 20k minimum to start doing it justice... That being said if sb wants to try writing a shorter version or is inspired by it to write anything similar, absolutely feel free! Just pls lmk once it's done so I can read it :D

I also already wrote a college AU horse girl!Andy longfic before, and while that one was happier and this one would probably have quite some angsty vibes before reaching its happy ending, it still kind of feels like I've done this before, also reducing my motivation for it even more :( which is a pity really because I do really like the idea.

If you want to take on the story reply to this or send me an ask/dm and we can figure out how to do this, discord/email/docs or whatever :)

My tog tag list - I know it's been ages, if anyone wants off this list or if someone new wants on it, please let me know! -: @bobeau-beaubo @lesbianlotties (daniwouldnever) @ongreenergrasses @eyeh0rr0r @cantteachanoldguardnewquotes @badwolfkaily @andramaquynhs @depresbianintheclassicalsense @andy-the-scythian @cryhardanddanceharder @my-gaydar-is-on-point @spookyvoidangelskeleton @bookerandy @jackwolfskid @cinnamonplums @cruzwalters @kayivy @blacks-phoenix @binariesarebullshit @tea-lizzard @prevalent-masters @aftermillennia @youssefguedira (pierremichelofavignon) @salzundhonig @moonlightbuckley @genyathefirebird (rupzydaisy) @nickydestati @after-a-millennium @spacewitchqueen @damnbert @not-so-good-omen (innocent-gayngel) @rhubarbdreams-blog @bedalk

[seeingteacupsindragons]

Perhaps some of you remember that time I wrote up an entire essay for the TVTropes forums to get William cemented as a Magnificent Bastard because you literally have to get fictional characters vetted by people who care an absurd amount about this to add them to the trope page.

I am now back on my bullshit, and just got Albert confirmed (Louis is in the works, but the voting looks good for him so far). I did his write up today and it should be up later this week? I enjoy the short version as well.

And now:

The Work

Moriarty the Patriot is a (very loose) retelling of the Sherlock Holmes stories combined with James Bond set in the late 1800s, focused on Professor James Moriarty and exploring his motivations.

The Character

This post is to open a discussion specifically on Albert James Moriarty, older brother of Professor Moriarty (who we already confirmed) and one the Professor's Co-Dragons. Albert is the original "Moriarty" family member biologically who took the other two in as children, and is the leader of MI6 for most of the series.

Why Is He a Bastard

I mean, he kills his own younger biological brother and his mother by hand and then arranged for the entire rest of his family and servants to die in their sleep in a fire. So like. Is that enough?

He also took two orphan kids in, then basically said, "Hey, in exchange for getting your little brother heart surgery he needed to live, help me murder like so many people. Kthx."

He tends to come off colder than either of his brothers, which is sort of impressive since they're all murderers.

I like Albert, but he's certainly a bastard.

But Not That Bad?

Much like his brothers, Albert is trying in a very fucked up way to improve society by murdering people he thinks are making society worse. He is...trying to help in a Pay Evil unto Evil sort of way.

Honestly, Albert is the Moriarty brother who gets the least amount of sympathy from fans, although this shifted a fair amount after it was revealed he has severely untreated OCD, which is a massive contributing factor to his need to eliminate the hypocrisies of all these abusive nobles who keep going to Christian churches. But it's not like most people with OCD are murderers, so there's a limit to how far this Freudian Excuse is going to take him.

Is He Charming/Magnificent

Albert is, according to an official Japanese fan poll, the second most popular character in the series (second to the protagonist of the series, who won by a landslide). This seems to track from the interactions I've had with people. So people are charmed by him.

Albert is also in the series pretty much assigned to "socialization" on behalf of everyone else. He doesn't seem to really like it very much, but he gets along with people rather well. According to his official character profile, he's still getting asked out and courted even after losing his title and going to prison for the murders, so apparently people are really into him.

He also has a similar flair for the dramatic to his younger brother. This is absolutely a man who is going to revel in elaborate schemes and acting a part. While he often asks his brother to arrange details and plans, he always shows up to convince people that he's just so worried about his kidnapped brother, please help him, and oh, gasp, people have died, how tragic.

But Is He Brilliant?

This, I think, is a key factor in Albert's case here: Most of William's subordinates are very subordinate to him. It's made clear that William expects all of his crew to be able to think and plan for themselves and make their own decisions, but the series doesn't always take time to show that off for everyone. Albert does get that time.

Albert often sees opportunities before he engages William for a plan to make it work. Manipulating Mycroft Holmes into getting MI6 created so he could lead it was Albert's idea, and he executed the plan (and he leads MI6 when it's not doing Lord of Crime business), even if William came up with many of the details to help him out. Albert is the one who sees the potential in Adam Whitley and brings the topic up to William.

Also, Albert was the first person to bring William's dreams of killing nobles and creating a brighter world into fruition and set it into a tangible, real path. He and William are frequently tagged as the only two who originated the entire plan.

Albert is a brilliant opportunist and an excellent man to have making sure everything goes off without a hitch, even if the details of getting things done aren't really his forte.

He's brilliant.

What About His Competition?

Most of the nemeses in the series are focused on William, and Albert is his subordinate. Basically none of Sherlock or Milverton's attention ever splashes Albert's way. The person he really engages with in a competitive dance with is...Mycroft Holmes. And while Albert doesn't exactly win, neither does he lose to Mycroft. They come to a couple of agreements and passes to work together and watch to make sure the other isn't getting in their way.

Verdict:

Yes.

[x-on-the-calendar-business]

ryan ross iceberg tier 3

tier 1, tier 2, tier 4, tier 5, tier 6, tier 7, tier 8

into the waters:

cricket and clover:

also known as the cabin album, this is the scrapped album that panic! wrote in 2007 when they locked themselves in a cabin in nevada (hence the nickname). according to a tweet from jon, 14 songs were written for the album, only 3 of which ever saw the light of day [i]. however, this tweet seems to have been deleted.

one song was folkin’ around, which of course made it onto pretty. odd.

another was nearly witches, which made it on vices & virtues, but the demo version is very different from the official version. you can listen to the demo here [ii].

the last song that we know of from this album is it’s true love. this song was performed once in 2007 at summerfest; unfortunately, the quality isn’t the best [iii]. however, this song still gives good insight into what the album would’ve sounded like, which is very different from fever but similar to pretty odd (although sources state the album still sounded very different from both previous and future works) [iv].

the album was intended to be a concept album, with each song leading into the next story wise. it would tell a love story between two people named cricket and clover [iv].

in 2018, jon also tweeted that he found some cricket and clover demos at his dad’s house, but it seems he does not have the authority to release them [iv]. genius also released a number of song titles, but jon also said that those names were not accurate [i].

we also have this image of ryan’s handwritten lyrics for songs unreleased from the album.

besides these small snippets of information, it’s safe to assume this album will remain lost to time forever, unless someone gives jon the permission to leak the demos (please).

i’m afraid that i:

on the 2006 summer tour, and specifically on live in denver, panic! covered karma police by radiohead. this entry refers to a part of that song in which ryan sings the line “i’m afraid that i.” ryan fans became obsessed with this clip and it’s taken on a life of its own.

you smell like a slut:

this also references a clip from the live in denver dvd. rather than explaining it, i’ll just let the video explain itself.

the moat:

in 2010, ryan tweeted at one of his friends that he could “float in [ryan’s] moat until he gets settled,” implying that ryan has a moat around his house [v].

i also found this panic! confession, but i’m not sure of the legitimacy of the claim nor of the house in the photo actually being the home ryan lived in (i hope it wasn’t) [vi].

eta: i think that actually is his house because in a podcast, he talks about how people have shown up to his house and made him scared to even open the door for the mailman :( with that being said, i removed the original image because i don't feel comfortable having a pic of his house in this (idk if he still lives there, but regardless). it is still in the source i linked if you're really curious, but it should go without saying that no one should show up to his house.

it’s the end of the electric guitar era:

this is a clip from the documentary, the calendar business, in which ryan says he was so frustrated with one of his guitars. so, he said “it’s the end of the electric guitar era” and burned it.

i’ll also link the full documentary here because it’s an interesting watch itself! [vii]

coachella:

for a few years, ryan went to coachella. i know he was definitely at 2015 and 2016, but also maybe 2011 and 2013 [viii].

he was also pictured with cristofer drew at one of them (nevershoutnever) which doesn’t mean anything significant; it’s just an interesting tidbit to me because nsn started my emo phase lmao

gabe saporta:

my king.

gabe saporta, formerly of midtown and cobra starship (both incredible bands that you should check out), was an absolute icon of fueled by ramen bandom. in the presplit days, he and ryan were buddies, as were most bands on that label, but after the divorce ryan got to keep gabe. they used to frequently post on instagram hanging out. we don’t really see them together much these days, but to be fair, ryan disappeared from the internet and gabe is the father of two kids. so i’m sure they’re still friends offline!

there is also this absolutely iconic friends or enemies interview that gabe did with ryan that everyone should watch here [ix] (also guy ripley saying “delicious” in the background at the end means everything to me).

eta: this post was made before gabe made all of those zionist comments about the genocide in palestine, so i feel i should clarify that he is no longer my king and it's free palestine and fuck israel forever :)

vicky t:

victoria asher, professionally known as vicky t, is another former member of cobra starship. she and ryan did hang out in the presplit days of course, but also some in the post split days. it seems she remained friends with all of panic! though.

however, vicky is extremely problematic and transphobic, which is detailed more here [x]. she also works with britney spears these days, and from what i can tell, britney’s fans do not have good things to say about vicky. but this is really not the place to dive into that.

keltie and jac podcast and books:

so kitty from glee and two of ryan ross’ exes start a podcast…

seriously though, keltie knight, jac vanek, and becca tobin run a podcast called lady gang, and ketlie and jac have discussed ryan on it before. in this interview from 2017, they say that they met because of a mutual ex, saying, “he was kind of known for a minute” and, “we don’t speak the name; it’s like voldemort.” [xi]. they also say they’re not sure if he’s still alive, and well…valid. in a tumblr post from 2018, an anon states that keltie talked about selling ryan’s clothes in an episode and that she and jac were saying mean things about him [xii]. also, in this podcast episode from last year, jac and keltie talk about ryan from about 05:25 to 08:10; they wonder if he has a girlfriend and what he is up to now, and keltie talks about how she regrets being messy in the relationship and writing her book, and how she tried to contact him when hobo died [xiii].

i’ve already talked about it some before, but in 2010, keltie released a book called “rockettes, rockstars, and rockbottom.” this book has an entire section dedicated to her relationship with ryan called “the dreamer” – the dreamer being the alias she uses to refer to him throughout. when describing the beginning of their relationship, she talks about how young he was very often, saying he was still a child and that he had a hard time passing for even 14, amongst other examples. as i said in tier 2, the age gap in their relationship was important because of the power dynamics, as evidenced in the book. from what i gather from the book, their relationship was messy, codependent, and, for lack of a better word, toxic. keltie is allowed to talk about her life, but it doesn’t sit right with me that she went into intimate detail about their relationship when ryan is such a private person. ryan was definitely not innocent in this relationship either, though; they both had their issues that they needed to work out on their own rather than keltie trying to fix ryan or him wanting her to. luckily, as i said before, keltie does regret writing the book at least.

if for some reason you’re interested in reading her book, you can find it for free here [xiv]. you just need to make an internet archive account and check it out hourly.

(also a side note that i did in fact listen to lady gang and read keltie’s book for this entry, so please at least give me kudos for that if nothing else)

5th member of 1d:

on march 25, 2015, zayn malik left one direction, and so naturally, people wanted to fuck with their fans. someone edited the official 1d wikipedia page and added ryan under their list of current members. 1d fans on twitter subsequently had meltdowns, exclaiming “WHO IS RYAN ROSS” (i mean c’mon they were in an emotional, vulnerable state). ryan ended up changing his twitter bio to say, “NOT in 1D” and made a tweet about it [xv].

scholarship:

when panic! was first getting its start, ryan received a full scholarship from the university of nevada las vegas for writing. however, he dropped out after one semester to focus on the band, which his dad did not approve of.

he talks about it in live in denver from 58:45 until 59:18 [xvi].

the boy who blocked his own shot:

this is song by brand new off their 2003 album deja entendu (fuck jesse lacey). it’s on this iceberg because ryan loved this song and posted about it on his lj a lot, along with the rest of the album. i know he specifically quoted another song, okay i believe you but my tommy gun don’t, as well.

blinkexists@aol.com:

when ryan was a teenager, this was his email. in fact, it is the email he used to communicate with pete wentz. pete talked about it in this interview with mark hoppus, starting at 02:00 [xvii].

moulin rouge:

this is a movie musical released in 2001 that ryan was obsessed with and one of his favorite movies. i don’t really have any other source for this than trust me bro, but i promise it’s true.

original singer for panic!:

when panic! first started, and even when brendon initially joined the band, ryan was the singer. however, they heard brendon singing back up during brand practice one day and asked him to be the singer rather than the guitarist.

ryan and brendon talk about it some in live in denver from 38:46 to 41:23 [xviii]. specifically my favorite quote from this is, “it felt right to have confident sounding lyrics behind a confident voice.”

(also i’m trying to be objective throughout this but let me just say this for context and transparency: i hate brendon urie LMAO)

guitarist ryan ross declined to be interviewed:

in 2015, billboard published this article for the 10 year anniversary of a fever you can’t sweat out [xix]. they reached out to multiple people to interview for the article, including brendon, jon, pete wentz, producer matt squire, manager scott magelberg, and bob mclynn. underneath this, it says spencer and brent could not be reached. it also says, “guitarist ryan ross declined to be interviewed.” people just thought it was funny because he would decline. he is living the hermit life for real.

so that’s all for tier 3. next we move onto a deeper layer, when i really feel like we get into some stuff the average fan wouldn’t know, which i am excited to delve into. gonna be honest though, it’s gonna be a long one.

tier 4

references:

[i] https://panicatthedisco.fandom.com/wiki/Cricket_%26_Clover

[ii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfsssP9lwII

[iii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNE4U5Yy-BE

[iv] https://lostmediawiki.com/Cricket_and_Clover_(partially_found_scrapped_Panic!_At_The_Disco_album;_2007)

[v] https://failross.livejournal.com/61466.html?thread=1787418

[vi] https://panicconfessions.tumblr.com/page/138

[vii] https://vimeo.com/164855487

[viii] https://twitter.com/search?q=ryan%20ross%20coachella&src=typed_query

[ix] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGe0fR5OM80

[x] https://ocalaghan.tumblr.com/post/157422369150/vickytransphobe-master-post

[xi] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEwgcmUJbkE

[xii] https://pathetic-at-the-disco.tumblr.com/post/171494458406/keltie-talks-about-selling-ryans-clothes-in-one

[xiii] https://www.podcastone.com/episode/LG-QUICKIE-Not-Gonna-Lie-Part-2

[xiv] https://archive.org/details/rockettesrocksta0000coll/mode/2up

[xv] https://www.altpress.com/one_direction_fans_think_ryan_ross_is_joining_the_bandand_theyre_furious/

[xvi] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLWcbA2fhHI&t=3466s

[xvii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLD8sHVgEnA

[xviii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLWcbA2fhHI&t=2326s

[xix] https://www.billboard.com/music/rock/panic-at-the-disco-fever-you-cant-sweat-out-oral-history-pete-wentz-brendon-urie-6707864/

[ashplayz]

Helluva boss x Y/n (my aus)

I've done a version of this with the hazbin hotel characters already. I wrote these because I'm considering taking requests for scenarios with the characters I'm doing for both shows but anything I write will generally follow my au for each character.

Characters included:

Loona. Moxxie and Millie (together as a poly) agent's one and two (together as a poly) fizzarolli and asmodeus (together as a poly) Verosika Mayday, Stella. Jesse (he's the bouncer from ozzies. Mrs. Mayberry (teacher lady from episode one)

The characters I didn't include I won't be writing for not necessarily because I don't like those characters just because I'm not entirely comfortable on my ability to write for certain characters. I love Blitz and Stolas obviously queen bee too, Not so much striker.. I just don't know how well I can write for those characters. Once we get to see more of Barbie wire I'll consider writing one for her..

Warnings:

Language, mentions of abuse atempted suicide, murder ect.

Loona x non binary Y/n:

Loona was sniffing as she stepped out of Beelzebubs party. She was upset knowing she could never compare to the queen bee. But she actually really really liked vortex, she knew she didn't even have a shot however.. She was about to call Blitz to come pick her up when a voice caught her attention. "Hey there, what's a pretty lady like you doing out here alone?" The voice asked. Loona turned to see a stunning demon that bore a very similar likeness to Bezzlebub, their h/c colored hair having stars mixed in that shone like rainbows. and their h/c colored eyes gleaming with mischief. It was Y/n, the sibling of Queen Beelzebub, a renowned figure in the same line of work as Angel dust. Loona's heart skipped a beat. She had heard stories about Y/n and seen them in the papers, but seeing them in person was a whole different experience. Y/n was not only incredibly beautiful but also known for their charisma and talent in the line of work they were in.

Y/n flashed a warm smile and sat down beside Loona. "So, what's got you looking so glum at this fabulous party?" Loona sighed, her ears drooping. "It's just... I've been having a rough day, and being here only reminds me of how alone I am. Everyone seems to be having a great time except for me." Y/n's eyes softened with understanding. "I can relate. Sometimes, even the most glamorous events can feel empty. But you know what? The key is to find someone who makes you feel like you belong, someone who sees your worth and appreciates you for who you are.Y/n said gently. They knew all too well how Loona was feeling being the sibling of such a popular icon as Beelzebub didn't always feel great.. Y/n chuckled and gently nudged Loona's shoulder. "If you're up for it. let's go do something fun instead of sitting here sulking" Y/n Said. It didn't take long for the two of them to grow very close. As the pair both had their own problems and sadness but they were able to help each other.

Millie + Moxxie x Fem sinner reader:

Blitz had been too busy to work on yet another case so he assigned it to Moxxie and Millie. Upon meeting the client they were both starstruck as she was certainly eye-catching. She was a high-profile client named Y/n. She was seeking revenge on the person that killed her, she wouldn't exactly give a lot of details on how she died or who the person was to her because it was clearly difficult for her to talk about. As they delved deeper into the case, Moxxie and Millie realized that they crossed paths with Y/n more often than they anticipated, and it made them question a few things as the pair couldn't seem to focus on the task at hand but rather Y/n in particular their paths intertwined again and again. The more they interacted with Y/n, the more they wanted to know about this mysterious client. One evening, after a particularly long day of investigating, Moxxie and Millie found themselves alone in their office. The atmosphere was heavy with unspoken feelings and lingering glances. Millie broke the silence. "Moxxie, do you ever think about... adding someone else to our relationship?" she asked hesitantly. Moxxie looked down at the table as his mind was running, he had heard about polyuamous relationships but he never considered the possibility of them being in one as they had always been content with just the two of them more than content. But it wasn't something he was really against per say. "You mean with Y/n?" Moxxie asked.

"Yeah.. I mean she does seem pretty cool and all.. I mean we've been together for a year now so we know we have a lot of love for each other, we could have enough love between the two of us for another person.." Millie said. Moxxie nodded. I get it. Y/n is... captivating, and I would like to know her more. If we're both on board, I don't see why we couldn't explore this, Millie. As long as she's okay with it of course" A mix of relief and excitement washed over Millie's face. "Really? You're okay with it?" Moxxie smiled warmly, reaching out to hold Millie's hand. "As long as we communicate openly and everyone involved is comfortable, I think it could be a new and exciting experience for all of us. We'll have to find a way to let Y/n know how we feel." They decided to wait until after the case was over until asking her out. It was a particularly tricky case after all. And they wouldn't have much of a shot if they failed to kill the target. Upon finishing the mission they invited Y/n to a celebratory dinner moxxie was relieved that blitz was too preoccupied with other things to interfere like he did with their last date at ozzies. They dressed up, wanting to make a good impression on Y/n, as well as each other

Agent one + agent two x fem sinner Y/n:

(I've already written a full story for this so I'll sum it up here)

Y/n worked at I. M. P but wasn't there when the events of 'truth seekers' took place. However she heard about all the batshitery that went down and was worried that the agentcy got stuff on them like recordings that could be used against them in the future so she went there using an ozmodin crystal to tie up loose ends. Only to get caught by agents one and two. As she was tied up she started flirting with the pair. After some time the pair ended up actually catching feelings for her. What they soon came to know was that y/n was in an abusive relationship with the person who was the reason for her death. I. M. P thankful found out and made him pay. While Y/n and the agents came to terms with their feelings for each other. Here's the full story 👇

https://www.tumblr.com/ashplayz/723952492806815744/agent-one-and-two-from-helluva-boss-x-reader-my?source=share

fizzarolli + asmodeus x fem imp:

Y/n was a famous imp singer. She had a voice that could silence even the loudest crowds. She was to perform a song at ozzies which is how the pair first met her. Even they were starstruck by her voice, especially considering her song wasn't about anything vulgar which was ironic considering the way the pair reacted to Moxxies love song. But what made Y/n so captivating wasn't her voice, it was her seemingly inability to feel or express emotions.Fizz and Ozzie didn't believe that she couldn't feel emotions however and were determined to get to the bottom of her stoic expression. The pair befriended her, it was ironic considering how unlikely the two of them seemed together, She was even more of a stark contrast to the pair of them. Fizz and Ozzie tried various things to get even a spark of emotions from her but to no avail, some things they tried ranged from party's to pranks for better or worse but nothing worked. The pair were frustrated at this but they weren't so easily deterd. But overtime the pair became closer to her and they soon saw just a tiny spark of something.. Happiness and this made the pair feel a spark of something as well as they realized how easy it was for them to see a future with her. Most people wouldn't guess that their relationship was actually genuine because it's the embodiment of lust with an imp that has a line of love dolls biased on him, but in reality the two actually cared a great deal for each other, dare even say loved each other in their own way. They had no problem seeing forever with each other. And they realized that they might actually both want to see a future with Y/n as well. But upon unlocking her emotions they learned there was a reason she wanted to stop feeling in the first place. She endured so much pain in life and couldn't handle the aftermath of that pain. Fizz understood this painfully well considering the accident he suffered at the hands of Blitzo leaving him burned and resulting in the loss of his arms and legs, but he turned that pain into the strength needed to continue on in life. The pair saw that she was slipping away from them but what could they do if all she did was push them away. They never told her about their feelings for her until it was almost too late, and it landed the pair in the emergency room. Once she was in stable condition the two fearfully admitted how they felt about her and how they would give anything for her to be okay. The road ahead was going to be a bumpy and difficult one but as long as the three of them stuck together they were ready to face it together.

Verosika Mayday x fem human:

While Verosika was performing her song 'Vacay to Bone town' during the events of spring broken, she saw a girl sitting out away from the growing crowd of her adoring fans not paying any mind. Verosika from a distance tried to use her charm to wow this girl, to which she looked up momentarily only to shift her attention elsewhere. Verosika had too big of an ego to take this sitting down, she had never seen anyone lose interest that quickly so she became determined to win over this human girl just to prove to herself that she hasn't lost her touch after her relationship with Blitzo and that she could still have anyone she wanted. After her performance she made her way over to the girl and introduced herself flirtatiously, the girl however seemed unfazed by this but nonetheless introduced herself as Y/n. Verosika grew more and more frustrated by the second because no matter what approach she took Y/n was still unfazed by her attempts. It didn't take long for Verosika to reveal the fact she was actually a demon and oddly enough that brought them closer. Verosika even went as far as to take Y/n to dates in hell. She was rich and highly influential so nobody said jack shit about it. As much as Y/n remained indifferent about Verosika's advances she couldn't deny the fact that they were incredibly close. And eventually Verosika couldn't deny the fact that her feelings for Y/n were genuine and not just to prove her ability to pull anyone. But Verosika hadn't been in a genuine relationship since Blitzo and it left her hurt and without a car and credit card. But nonetheless Verosika became determined to get Y/n to feel the same.

Stella x fem imp Y/n: (short)

Y/n had been friends with both Stella and stolas when they were kids and surprisingly got along well with both of them as they were both very different people as kids. Stella was often sad as a child her upbringing was anything but loving, as she was always under pressure to be perfect by her family. Y/n didn't come from a necessarily happy family either. So she understood Stella's pain and was there for her. But as Stella got older and her arranged marriage to stolas drew closer she began to change for the worse. And ended up pushing Y/n away and hurting her deeply. Y/n went on to achieve big things while Stella ended up sorting through the rubble of her broken marriage. Stella had only herself to blame deep down she knew that but she had too much pride to revert back to the person she used to be as she viewed herself back then to be weak, her reason for feeling this way was the fact that then she had fallen for an imp, Y/n to be exact. Stolas cheating on her with blitz only reminded her of that fact and she hated it. But Y/n had heard about Stella and stolas's divorce and decided to drop in and check on her old friends. Stella had hurt her badly and due to that she held a lot of bitterness towards her. But she couldn't hide the fact that she loved the person Stella used to be.

Jesse (the bouncer from ozzies) x fem succubus Y/n: (short)

Jesse had lost a bet to his friends and as a result they made him ask out a new succubus that had just started working at ozzies, what made her special in particular was the fact she didn't act like a normal succubus as she rejected every one who asked her out and Jesse was no different. Her rejection definitely hurt his big ego so he didn't give up. Eventually he did opt to being her friend as a way to get close enough to her to have a better shot but the pair did actually end up becoming good friends. And he learned the reason behind her rejecting everyone was because she had been badly hurt be someone she loved. He was a sinner and they started a relationship pretty early on. But he learned that redemption was possible and decided to go for it despite the fact he promised her that he loved her too much to ever leave her. In the end he left her like she was nothing and so she vowed never to fall in love again. But at this point it was no longer a dare to Jesse he actually genuinely liked her a great deal but he had his work cut out for him when it came to getting her to trust him enough to date him.

Mrs. Mayberry (technically ex Mrs Mayberry)

X fem sinner Y/n: (short)

When mrs. Mayberry first entered hell; she was dazed and confused, also incredibly devastated by what had happened before her untimely death and by her own actions. She desperately needed a place to stay so she went to an apartment complex type thing only to learn that there were no open apartments available. She was told to try to room with someone and Y/n happened to be the first one she asked. Y/n was cold and came across as rude but nonetheless she allowed Mayberry to stay with her until she got her own place as long as she got a job and paid her share of the rent. Y/n was the one to suggest that Mayberry take revenge on the whore who slept with her husband. Seeing as Y/n had also hired I. M. P to settle a score. Overtime the they became closer and despite y/n still obtaining her hash attitude Mayberry couldn't help but fall for her.

As you can probably tell I lost motivation halfway through.

[presidenthades]

Once again, I am doing a series of my behind-the-scenes thoughts for The Golds while I do light edits for formatting, typos, and continuity. Here’s Chapter 4!

For this chapter’s title, I picked the Crone’s lyrics from “The Song of the Seven” because Old Willow—who is a crone, as a wise older woman—is so important to this chapter.

Detective Aegon was one of the things I was most excited about as I wrote this fic. The idea was born when I read that TGC interview where he said Aegon is “intelligent and has a keen eye for the weak spots for others.” I extrapolated that as Aegon being observant about what makes people tick, which made me think about Sherlock, then I realized my version of Aegon would love being a detective. He gets to run around the city, meet interesting people, and feel a bunch of adrenaline/endorphins/dopamine.

I think Aegon is also very driven by the pursuit of dopamine. In canon, this manifests in his heavy dependency on wine and sex. In this verse, he gets tons of dopamine from his interactions with Jace. But since Jace is preoccupied with the pregnancy and governance and court, he’s deprived at the moment. So in this chapter, he explores his newfound detective hobby which makes him a bit less dependent on Jace for gratification—but not much. Still a simp for his wife 🥲.

Aegon is a night owl, Jace is an early bird. This isn’t an issue in the early days of their marriage because…well, they’re pretty much having sex whenever they’re in the bedroom, and sleep is optional 😂. But the honeymoon period tapers off right around when they discover the pregnancy, and it’s also when Jace’s LIWs are getting accustomed to their roles. The LIWs in particular are jarring for Aegon. LIWs are supposed to have lots of access to their mistress’ rooms, which isn’t a big deal in a traditional marriage where the husband and wife keep separate rooms, and the husband usually sends a message in advance if he wants to “visit” his wife at night. But Aegon has moved in with Jace, and whereas he views the LIWs as intruding on his private time with his wife, the LIWs view him as impeding their ability to do their job.

I decided that Arryk likes Aegon more than Erryk does (another reason the twins choose different sides in the Dance), and that’s why Aegon thinks Arryk is more fun. Erryk was more judgmental during Aegon’s debauchery days whereas Arryk was more chill. As a result, Aegon learned to tell the difference between them, because he wanted to be sure which twin he’s been saddled with. But Aegon likes to mess with people, so he deliberately gets Erryk’s name wrong because Erryk is annoying/inconveniencing him by dragging him to Viserys.

In the show, Aegon/TGC throws some truly hateful glares at Viserys, but at the same time his dialogue shows he longs for his father’s approval. Here, Aegon clings to that resentment (simmering not burning) but is much less interested in Viserys’s approval. He has plenty of approval and affection from Jace, so even though it stings that Viserys doesn’t care, Aegon can shrug it off more easily because he has something/someone better.

Viserys’s story in the show about the horses and coloring, and various comments about how he would’ve been happier as a simple country lord than as king, inspired me to give him amateur agricultural interests. He’s never done any actual farming, but he likes to read about it and daydream about his alternate universe life.

As I hope I made clear in the scene, Viserys is having this conversation for Jace’s benefit rather than Aegon’s. His favoritism for Rhaenyra’s line continues to abound in this universe, and he follows the old-fashioned school of thought that pregnant woman should refrain from having sex, ostensibly to protect the fetus.

In an early draft, Alicent was the one who had a similar conversation with Aegon to leave Jace alone. Alicent’s desire for this conversation was born from her own experience of being relieved not to have to continue having sex with her husband while pregnant. But I changed it because a) Alicent already has enough haters and I didn’t want to add fuel to the fire, and b) it was more thematically appropriate for Viserys to have this talk, since this is a story about Aegon’s journey to fatherhood and I always planned for him to have some kind of “confrontation” with Viserys near the end of the fic. So I needed another scene that highlights the friction between Aegon and Viserys…also I had a lot of fun with the agricultural metaphors 😂.

When Aegon wanders the city at the beginning of this chapter, he is content but aimless. Although he thinks this is exactly what he wants—freedom to do nothing of consequence and just run around—deep down he wants something more purposeful. He needs some kind of goal/target or he falls into a bored malaise, as he does later in the chapter. The detective adventures eventually fill this need, then later taking care of Jace after her kidnapping, then eventually assuming a role in the game to protect his family.

House Tyrell has no history of being kings, and they still seem like they’re finding their footing as lord paramount of the Reach at this point in time. House Hightower is a very old and revered house with a history of being kings, so I feel like Aegon and his siblings may have inherited an ancestral disdain of the Tyrells 😂.

Jace loves roses, but I imagine a Tyrell lady at the garden party getting snooty about how “roses are so very Tyrell.” Similar to Jace’s feelings about colors, she feels like sigils—especially something as common as a rose—shouldn’t belong to any one family.

I did a lot of research about pregnancy for this fic. I came across a few stories of pregnant people getting nauseated during sex because of the jostling movements. I thought that would be very unfortunate for Jace and Aegon…so I made it happen 🙈. And it adds to Aegon’s growing feeling that his presence is a burden during Jace’s pregnancy.

The LIWs are there to make Jace’s life easier, not Aegon’s. So Jace views them as very helpful while Aegon (who is actually a “private” person at heart re: how he wants to live his life) sees them as intruders. This change isn’t sudden but gradual, taking place over the span of several weeks, like the frog in boiling water metaphor. It doesn’t occur to Aegon to protest until it’s too late, and even then, he sees how the LIWs are helping her a lot and he doesn’t want to take that from her. So he doesn’t say anything to Jace.

The LIWs have a designated solar they could hang out in, but they’re eager to stay close to Jace while she’s ill and nauseated. I also think they’re following Rhaena’s example, and Rhaena is used to having free rein to Jace’s rooms. And I don’t want to throw even more shade on Elinor, but her crush on Aegon is compelling her to go to Jace’s rooms fairly early in the morning in the hopes of catching him shirtless 🤭.

Overall, the line “there was no room for Aegon in Jacaera’s chambers when her ladies occupied it” encapsulates a lot of his feelings of being squeezed out of Jace’s life while she’s dealing with so many other things.

I read in a fanfic somewhere (no idea which fic) the theory that dragons are assumed male until they show signs of gestation or lay eggs. I like this theory because it helps explain why so many dragons seem to be male, and F&B has a line quibbling about the rumor that Vermax laid eggs at Winterfell (I think it’s Eustace who lambastes the theory that dragons can change sex). If Vermax did lay eggs, the “assumed male until otherwise proven” theory jives with him being called male previously. Also, I don’t know how dragon anatomy works, but one can assume that it’s difficult to tell males and females apart as hatchlings, and by the time they develop reproductive parts, you don’t really want to be examining them too closely.

I also wanted to make Vermax female so she and Sunfyre could parallel Jace and Aegon. Jace’s first pregnancy coincides with Vermax’s first gestation, and there’s some foreshadowing with Vermax’s three eggs later 👀. Also, I make the dragons’ personalities reflective of their riders’. Vermax is very docile and calm, while Sunfyre is a horny daredevil.

In this chapter, Aegon is still struggling to come to terms with impending fatherhood. He can’t help but feel like the pregnancy has been coming in between him and Jace rather than bringing them closer together, he’s got a lot of his own daddy issues to work out, and he’s still in a “I do what a want, no responsibilities” mindset. But even now, he secretly wants to grow and mature out of this; he imagines placing a dragon egg in his child’s cradle, and it gives him some warm fuzzies.

I imagine there’s a lot of conflict between the maesters and Targaryens whether it’s safe for pregnant women to ride dragons. The maesters wouldn’t consider it safe to ride horses, and riding dragons seems even more dangerous. Meanwhile the Targs are confident in their dragon bonds protecting them. My headcanon is that Rhaenyra and other female dragonriders, unless they’re exceptionally bold/reckless, at least spend their first pregnancy on the ground to be safe. But if that pregnancy goes well, they’re a lot more confident about flying during later pregnancies. Jace is already a cautious person by nature, so she would abide by the maesters’ recommendations.

Jace honestly doesn’t need to/shouldn’t do so many Small Council things right now, but she’s an overachiever. In the modern world, she’s the kind of person who volunteers for all the extra projects at work so she can prove herself. Aegon calls himself a lazy person with a skewed sense of what is urgent, but in this case, he’s actually right about Jace doing too much. One of his weaknesses: he thinks Jace is so perfect that he hesitates to tell her when she’s in the wrong.

Ever since the witch shouted at Joff during the wedding parade, Joff has been thinking a lot about her. She’s been trying to research what the witch said but she’s reached a dead end, so now the only avenue is going straight to the source. I dropped hints in Chapter 2 of the Handbook that Aegon was Joff’s curse tablet dealer, so she goes to him for help. Aegon is a skeptic about witchcraft at this point in the story, but we know that changes later.

Joff has a talent for insulting Targ men where it hurts. Daemon bore the brunt of it in the Handbook, but now it’s Aegon’s turn with the “big baby” comments 😂.

I’ll probably come up with more backstory for Old Willow in Joff’s fic. I imagine her to have genuine powers of some sort (foresight/prophecy at the very least). She isn’t super powerful, but the people around her respect/fear her as the real deal. She makes her money mostly by doing non-magic witchy things, like brewing moon tea, which is in higher demand and more affordable than the occasional curse tablet.

Joff has a prickly personality, but she can and will fight people in defense of her sisters 🤺.

The puncture wounds on Old Willow’s body are from the longshoreman hook that the Tyroshi sometimes carries around. Her death is over-the-top because, as is established in later chapters, the Tyroshi is a sadist. He decides to kill her because she supplied the love/beauty charm to the whore Daisy, so he deems Old Willow guilty as an accomplice.

Because Joff has been thinking about Old Willow a lot, she’s also been thinking about the curse tablet she used several years ago. I’ve deliberately been ambiguous in the story text about what exactly Joff did with the tablet, but many readers have pieced together that Laenor’s death was involved somehow. So Joff has been thinking a lot about her father’s death, and the guilt she’s feeling seeps into her reaction to Old Willow’s death. Old Willow’s death does greatly inconvenience Joff’s little quest, but Joff is also feeling a lot of things about murder victims and the loved ones they leave behind.

Old Willow’s murder was very different in early drafts. Originally the Tyroshi wasn’t involved at all, and Daisy was the murderer because she blamed Old Willow for the love/beauty charm wearing off, and the random whore on the street played a bigger role in helping Aegon investigate. But as I reassessed how I wanted the second half of the fic to go, I reorganized the side characters’ roles and reduced the unnecessary minor characters so they didn’t distract too much from the main story.

Aegon sometimes makes questionable decisions (is it really a good idea to bring a 9-year-old princess to Flea Bottom without any guards at night?), but he has a few “eldest sibling” instincts that foretell what he’ll be like as a father. He tries to keep Joff out of actual trouble (don’t anger the locals, don’t open the bottle that might be poison), shows empathy to her (realizes this must be the first dead body she’s seen even though Joff acts dark and morbid), and gives Joff time to sort through her messy emotions about the witch’s death (lets her investigate the hut instead of immediately dragging her out—although he could also be criticized for letting a kid linger around a dead body). Basically, as a big brother/uncle/good-brother, he’s pretty indulgent and lets Joff explore her interests so to speak, but he intervenes if he suspects imminent danger. After Cheeseball is born, Aegon is understandably very protective of him. But when Cheeseball grows old enough, I see Aegon as being willing to let him run around and potentially fall and scrape his knees, because that’s just a natural part of life and relatively harmless—but Aegon would absolutely stop Cheeseball from running off the edge of a cliff.

I made Joff an early bird because I wanted to thwart the trope that dark witchy character = night owl 😄.

Bethany likes teasing Elinor about her crush on Aegon, hence the little exchange about Elinor making a good posset. But if Bethany suspected Elinor actually wanted to seduce Aegon (which she doesn’t), I think Bethany would draw the line and might even tattle on Elinor. We see in Chapter 5 that Bethany takes her duty to Jace seriously when it matters.

Aegon is right about Jace not enjoying gruesome murder stories, and telling her about his and Joff’s adventures right then would’ve kept her awake for a long time. But his quality time with Jace is limited so he doesn’t get a chance to tell her about it before the feast disaster. The miscommunication trope can be tricky because it’s so easy to make the people involve ridiculously stupid for plot reasons, so I was trying my best to lay the foundations for genuine reasons they wouldn’t have the opportunity to talk to each other. And the miscommunication doesn’t last for long. I think it’s a week at most between Aegon and Joff going to Flea Bottom and the feast.

Just like Vermax and Sunfyre parallel Jace and Aegon, I wanted Syrax and Caraxes to parallel their riders. Rhaenyra has plenty of thoughts about Aegon as Jace’s husband, but she views it as a good thing if a couple has a healthy sex life, hence Syrax’s lack of concern. Meanwhile Caraxes shares Daemon’s antipathy toward Aegon/Sunfyre 😂.

Gyles is jittery because the Tyroshi has been increasing his demands for payment, which Gyles can’t fulfill. A little foreshadowing for later in the chapter.

I priced a bottle of moon tea at three pennies because that’s the price of a fresh fruit tart during Robert’s reign. Ignoring things like inflation, I thought that was a good benchmark: affordable for the smallfolk, but for a whore who’s barely making it on the streets, she has to choose between the moon tea or eating that day. Aegon has selfish motivations when he gives her the entire crate in exchange for information, but it’s a huge windfall for her, especially if she can sell or trade the moon tea she isn’t using herself.

Old Willow warns her customers that magic always has a price (a recurring theme in ASOIAF). I’m sure she warned Joff when she first bought the curse tablet, and the consequences of that event led Joff to stop digging as much into magic the last few years. But Joff is tempted when she gets her hands on the glass candle, and she learns that lesson again later in this fic.

Aegon compares the whore to a courtier because he’s realizing that all people are fundamentally the same, they just wear different clothes and have more or less money. No matter what level of society, everyone loves gossip/scandal.

The rumors of Daisy’s death are not entirely true, but they’re not too far off the mark, and you can see how the rumors developed based on the true version (as told by the madam). Usually the rumors are worse than the truth, but in this case, parts of the truth are even worse than the rumors.

The description of the Garden’s building is intended to evoke a sense of lukewarm attempts to prettify something miserable at its core, like the girls who work there. I added the detail of the woman drinking on the roof because if she falls and breaks her neck, oh well, it’s not like her life was that great 😢.

Undercover!Aegon is the obvious next step in the evolution of Detective!Aegon. Other than his hair color, he doesn’t have as striking Valyrian features like Aemond and Daemon, and he’s mingled enough with the commoners that he can imitate their mannerisms. (Just imagine Aemond trying to pull off that disguise 💀.)

Even though Aemond is right there, Daeron chooses to run to Aegon for advice on girls/women instead. Aegon actually managed to marry the woman he wanted while Aemond is stuck in a flirty limbo, so Daeron concludes that Aegon is the more successful brother 😂. S2 might change my mind, but S1 Aemond is NOT a womanizer/smooth talker/expert on the fairer sex. The same applies in this AU, although Aemond is fairly well-versed in one particular woman…but even so, he still puts his foot in his mouth a lot.

Aegon is NOT shy about nudity lmao. He seems pretty content to loaf around in various states of undress in canon, and so is he here.

I love writing parallel scenes. In Chapter 3, we got Jace having sisterly bonding with Joff and Helaena, and now it’s Aegon’s turn to have brotherly bonding with Daeron and Aemond. And again, Aegon’s traits as a brother foretell what he might be like as a father. He caves underneath Daeron’s puppy face and indulges Daeron in a city outing so he can buy presents for Joff, but when they’re about to enter a sticky situation with the investigation, he tries to send Daeron home. Just imagine what Aegon will be like when Cheeseball gets his first crush 🥰.

Aegon’s statement “I never make Jace angry” was the universe setting him up to make her angry 💀. But Aegon was also kinda right about how groveling stops Jace being angry, because we see him talk his way out of the doghouse in Chapter 5.

I am convinced by the Episode 8 last supper scene that Aegon and Aemond have some brotherly telepathy going on, and that telepathy is even stronger in this verse where they’ve spent more time together in the Stepstones. Hence their ten-second silent exchange where they plan what to do about the mysterious noise in the hatch.

Notice that Aegon instinctively reassures Ronnel and cleans him up a bit. Big brother/dad instincts coming in 🥰. Aegon categorically refuses to help Ronnel with the bathroom (Ronnel wasn’t asking for help anyway, he was asking permission to go), but when it comes to his own kid? See Chapter 10 and how Aegon very studiously helps Cheeseball pass gas 😂.

Gyles and Ronnel know who Aegon is, but they call him “milord” because they aren’t used to interacting with highborns and they figure that address is suitable for anyone of noble birth. Aegon isn’t fussy about addresses and titles so he never corrected them.

Aemond has been doing his homework about dockworkers while at Driftmark. He wants to impress his future grandfather-in-law 😆.

Daeron and Ronnel are the same age, but Ronnel looks younger. Daeron has grown up on a rich diet and ample physical training. Ronnel has never gone hungry, but he doesn’t get as much variety in his diet as Daeron does, and the physical labor that Ronnel does (helping his father make pies) isn’t very conducive to body-building.

Daemon followed the Targbros because he’s nosy and curious about what would get all three of them out of the castle on an important day for Aegon. He got bored during the shopping trip and but became intrigued again when they discovered the abduction, and now he’s piecing together why Aegon has been acting so oddly the past week. Daemon is sticking around for the adventure so he can gather more information about Aegon’s doings, and because a kidnapping ring in the city is something that would interest most people. But also I think Daemon has been bored with domesticity and he wanted a bit of adventure 😂.

This is the point when Aegon forgets about the feast. His acquaintance/sort-of-friend has been violently kidnapped. That’s a big deal! And this is the kind of adrenaline rush that he enjoys. If he did remember the feast, I think Aegon would still embark on the rescue mission, but he would’ve at least sent a message back to the castle (or convinced Daeron to bring the message back).

I am sorry (not really), but I couldn’t resist making the pun “a stream of grizzled seamen trickled through” the brothel 🙈.

Yes, the madam got very excited by the prospect of three pretty Targaryen men. Can’t really blame her.

The madam mentions her “halfwit” guard. This is actually the brother she mentions in Chapter 6, whom the Tyroshi kidnaps to force her into helping him. I imagine the brother as a sweet and innocent guy, so I like to think he makes it out of the ordeal just fine and returns to the Garden. All the girls there like him, and he’s a large guy (I keep imagining someone like Hodor), so he can intimidate most customers who get too rowdy.

Currency fluctuates a lot in the ASOIAF universes, but at one point a gold dragon is the price of a horse. So that’s a lot of money Aegon is offering the madam, although of course as a prince, it isn’t much money to him. 100 gold dragons is apparently a reasonable ransom for a younger son of a noble family, so when the madam asks for 50 gold dragons for the building, she’s basically saying two of her building is equivalent to a ransom for Oscar Tully or Garmund Hightower.

Aegon claims not to care about royal titles or privileges, but he can still be a snob about things like carrying around a ridiculous amount of money (he’s got people for that). As Queen Clarisse Renaldi once said, “It’s not appropriate for royalty to jingle.”

“Help me, I’m drunk” was 100% inspired by “Get help” from Thor 3. I feel like all the distraction names are pretty self-explanatory. But in pretty much every variation, Aegon is the distraction because he’s a showboat, while Aemond ninja murders everybody.

One of the warehouse guards uses the phrase “pretty girl,” which is Aegon’s pet name for Jace, so that triggers him in addition to everything else.

The rescue is when Gyles becomes Aegon’s number one hype man. I had to delete some scenes with Gyles later in the fic because they didn’t flow well, but there’s a scene where Gyles says he wants to teach his son good values like loyalty, and he cites his loyalty to Aegon as an example.

The Garden’s girls stick around to watch the arrests. The night’s events improve their opinions of the Targs (Aegon in particular). There are other factors, like Aegon’s chill managerial style and him selling the brothel for almost-free to Liane, but this is part of the good karma that pays off later when Jace needs help.

Aegon does enjoy the gratitude he receives for the rescue, similarly to how in canon he laps up the crowd’s adoration during his coronation. So that dopamine hit adds to the appeal of continuing his detective work.

The Gyles & Ronnel reunion makes an impact on Aegon because it’s the first time he’s really seeing a loving father-son relationship and affection. It’s sort of a turning point that plants a seed in his mind of what sort of father he wants to be to his unborn child, because now he has evidence there’s an alternative to what he grew up with. Also, note how Aegon feels like a voyeur to this emotional intimacy, but he’s entirely unaffected by physical intimacy like what happens at the brothel.

Originally the chapter dragged on longer with a scene where the Targs help Gyles and Ronnel move their stuff into the Red Keep, because Aegon offers Gyles a job on the spot. There was a whole comedic bit where Gyles reveals the giant cheese wheel that got him into trouble with the Tyroshi. But I decided it would be better to end the chapter where it did, with Aegon realizing his mistake 🤭.

Chapter 5 commentary here