#inspired by a current ongoing event in my life i guess

[pillsopa]

talking online sounds awesome in concept but in practice I fucking suck at it. i’m robbed of my usual theatrics and mannerisms. an aimless jester

[fountainpenguin]

🌗 Half Hidden AU 🌗

Hermitcraft SMP

An urban fantasy "Hermits avoiding humans" mob hybrid AU

#ridwork guides

More MCYT AUs

What Is Half Hidden AU?

No matter how deep into their mob parents' lands the hybrids go, human towns keep encroaching. Every hybrid's got some version of the same ol' story- "Too human" for one side of the family, "too monster" for the other.

Survival in the jungle isn't easy, but at least it's home... or was, for a while. How many more seasons can they relocate, rebuild... avoid the hate and cruelties that hybrids receive? From both sides of their families, sometimes...

AO3 Series

Blog tag - #Half Hidden AU

Tone

Mostly found family fluff, angst, and romance. Some drama and comedy mixed in.

Mysticism and intrigue regarding magic, nature, and the world.

Characters

- All the Hermits, but few people outside Hermitcraft SMP. Not sure how many of them will show up in stories since I'm early in the AU, but they're all here in my heart.

- All mobs are anthros

- Grian has several half-siblings and adopted children that parallel his alter egos and supposed children in the canon.

Half-siblings: NPC Grian (Pre-Hermitcraft); Robot Grian (Pre-H); Ariana Griande (S6); Villager Grian (S6) Foster/adopted kids: Grumbot (S7); Jrumbot (S7); SnifferMyFeet (One-off)

Scar's also looking after his nephew (PiglinMyNose) with some help from Jimmy. Does that make Boyguna Pig's dad? ... idk, maybe.

- Occasional appearances from Empires characters, but they're not a focus.

- Current story drafts focus largely on Grian and Joel with plans to expand in the future as inspiration arrives.

Ships

- Joel (Wolf hybrid) / Lizzie (Axolotl hybrid) - They helped raise a kid named Hermes who mostly lives with his human father

- Grian's married to a parrot mob who lives outside the Hermit commune. He doesn't talk about it much.

Some background ships. More details to come as the AU expands.

Setting

Hermitcraft-themed locations, with emphasis on jungles and the coastline. There are some impressive builds, but most of them on a small scale due to limited space.

A focus on survival with some folks pushing for freedom and fun.

Is It For Me?

- Tense biological family relationships, but kindhearted found family

- Long-term anxiety underscoring people's lives. A sense of never being able to settle or achieve safety

- Non-human humanoids & interspecies relationships

- All mobs are anthros, but there's still meat-eating in this world. It's most common when mobs hunt mobs, but it's not unheard of for humans to hunt mobs and hybrids.

-> I don't plan to depict hybrid meat. Also, culture generally leans towards "good, civilized humans" eating plants they've farmed rather than "hunting and foraging like the animals."

- A general sense of finding sweetness and joy despite the nature of a difficult world

Major Themes

Found family, community, compassion, acceptance, identity, trust, anxiety, culture, love

Plot Highlights

- Hermits moving and rebuilding

- Awkward mixed-family interactions. Joel's family aren't too keen on his marrying a hybrid rather than a wolf mob.

- Welcoming new friends; adapting to the first day of the rest of your life. Rescuing people!

- Embracing (or rejecting) culture and expectations

- Exploring human society (Sneaky, sneaky!)

Ongoing?

This series debuted in the Hermitcraft Guess the Author event of 2024. It's ongoing with unscheduled updates, but several WIPs already outlined.

This probably won't be a very long series as I'm less familiar with Hermitcraft than the Life Series, but the idea for this one has been sitting with me a while. I'm glad to explore it.

Warnings, notes, and explanations below so readers can learn more about this AU. Don't like? Don't read.

�� Take a Peek

New here? You might like to start with these:

There's only one work in this series so far!

Start Reading

Recommended ways to get into the full AU

🌄 First Written - "Platypus Bird: Free to Good Home"

In which Grian and Joel, having saved a newborn sniffer hybrid from drowning, go through the basic motions of "What comes next?" - Like childproofing the floating foster home.

The first character and lore story completed for this AU. I've planned pieces both before and after this point in the SnifferMyFeet arc- this is just the one that came out first.

I tried to write it as an easy introduction to the lore without being too long or intense. It's a good place to start.

📅 Chronological Start - TBA

🗺️ Worldbuilding

- The vibe I started with was "Hermitcraft setting, but full of civilians." I expanded from that to having many towns and cities, some of which are more accepting towards mob and hybrid cultures than others.

- Close Hermitcraft parallels, though I'm only familiar with Seasons 6 to 10, and only from about 6 POVs.

- There's only one world. No servers- Everything exists within one and Hermits move to new areas instead of changing worlds.

- Mobs are both realistic and mystical. Hybrids may have some magic, but not as much as mobs, who have far more mastery of it. Mobs are looked on with some respect or fear.

- Mining, crafting, and inventory management are mystical too.

- Some people eat meat, but society caters well to vegetarian and vegan dishes; no one would bat an eye for requesting such (unless you're somewhere very unique indeed). Mobs and even hybrids may be killed for their meat in some places while others have greater protections.

- Mobs bring down other mobs for meat (Ex: wolves preying on sheep, fox on chickens). Some do attack humans, but these are usually zombies, endermen, phantoms, creepers, and other monsters (not real-world creatures).

-> I don't plan to depict hybrid meat, though some folks may make threatening remarks (Ex: "I bet you taste like chicken"). Also, culture generally leans towards "good, civilized humans" eating plants they've farmed rather than "hunting and foraging like the animals."

- It's common to build fantastic things, with one person capable of building a whole town if they put their mind to it. Resources are widely available, but not always renewable or easy to obtain. The existence of many settlements across the world has led to the largest resource yields being protected.

- Humanoid mobs like villagers, pillagers, and wandering traders are essentially equal with humans. They have their own cultures and language, but can speak with humans.

- Pigs and piglins are perceived as the same thing. I think in this AU, piglins are perceived as boars (male) and pigs as sows (female), and all under the name "piglin."

- Mob/human relationships are often frowned on, though some parts of the world are more accepting. Human/hybrid relationships may be looked at skeptically by those who believe they're too different to work. Hybrid/mob relationships may be seen as beastly.

- All hybrids are infertile.

📋 AU Notes & Warnings

Found Family - Taking in unrelated or semi-related people. Family relationships can be a bit fluid or undefined, though some do have more defined sibling or parent-child vibes.

Grian's raising several people who are his half-siblings, but he sees himself a bit more as a flock leader (or father) than a brother.

Mob hybrid racism (Whole AU is themed around pushback from mobs and humans alike)

-> Views differ even between individuals within the same society, so it's not easy to "simply move to an accepting place."

-> Chromia (Scott's S2 empire from Empires SMP) is often cited as very accepting, even providing medical treatment to hybrids that some places don't offer

-> AU depicts cruelty. Mostly towards hybrids, but towards humans and mobs sometimes as well. 3-week-old SnifferMyFeet got thrown in a river by his dad; that's the direction we're going.

Non-human humanoids - Mobs are human-sized anthros. Hybrids are also human-sized. Mobs are very animalistic, with behaviors and community structures mimicking real-world animals (such as hunting other animals, which means anthros in this AU).

-> Grian was taken from his mom because she only fed him worms and grubs when he was born; his hybrid body needed milk.

-> Hybrids also have many mob instincts, but to a lesser degree.

Interspecies relationships: Human/mob, human/hybrid, and hybrid/mob are all fair game.

Human/mob relationships can result in hybrid offspring

Hybrids are infertile

At the time of posting this AU guide, I'm not planning to write sexual content for this AU, but if I'm inspired, anticipate interspecies relationships in that regard too.

I do anticipate romantic gestures like kissing, and preening, grooming, and cuddling.

- More MCYT AUs

- Want more info? Send an Ask!

You can create works based on this AU. Please cite me and/or the AU as appropriate (i.e. for things very specific to this AU). You are free to expand on ideas you've thought of thanks to my AU as a jumping off point. I'd love to reblog or link things to my AO3 works if I see them!

I write content with morally gray characters. Please don't portray my story events or worldbuilding out of context with intentional malice. As in, I request you do not post things created for the specific intention of bashing me or the AU

[ineffablyendless]

Tag Game To Better Know You! Send this to people you'd like to know better!

Tagged by @munsonsbabygirlie , thank u Chromie! Last year, technically, that i keep forgetting to do but this feels like a nice way to start the New Year!

Book Im currently reading:

American Gods by Neil Gaiman! I'm trying to get a bit more into reading this year, but its been a hot minute and im crawling by slower than I expected. That being said I've got a whole list waiting for me, and I'm incredibly enjoying AG so far <3

What I usually wear:

Blue, if I'm being honest. Its not my actual favourite colour, but it's my comfort one. I can't reliably say jeans even: ive really grown into a good pair of slacks. Tho i suppose if youre trying to imagine me, think blue jeans, a battered second hand pair of yellowing high tops, a white tshirt and an old plaid shirt, and ive been told i wear my hijab a very recognizable way 😭 also blue

How tall I am:

157 cm last i checked, 5 feet exactly in american measurements i think...?

My star sign. Do I know any celebrities or historical event that shares it:

Im a libra! Im sure plenty of people got born and big events happened in the first half of October, but nothing comes to mind immediately. I suppose i dont care enough to remember, lol

Do I go by a name or nickname:

Nickname. I go by Choice in all cyberspaces. It's a name that endeared itself to me many years ago, its nothing close to my actual name, and I enjoy the broad line of separation between my lives on and offline. Irl tho, i usually dont go by a nickname, at least nothing used by anyone outside family, and thats even MORE closely guarded. So.

Did I grow up to be what I wanted to be as a child:

I was an angry, suicidal, incredibly hurt child, and I had no true ambition besides finding joy and holding on to it with both hands. I wanted to be content and left alone, most of all. I wanted to be happy.

I'm a lot happier now. It's an uphill battle. Baby me would be glad to see where I am now tho i think. I hope

Something I'm good at vs Something I'm bad at:

I am. Very good at speaking. I take pride in this, many have told me I have the innate talent with words and the know how to lead a team and control a room. I know how to get myself listened. On paper, I know what I want said. Many things. Words are a power I wield well.

Vs

I am, sincerely, not very good at empathy, nor sympathy. I struggle to look outside my periphery, to crawl outside my own head and pop my own bubble. I have come across as-not cold, but callous, cruel, a little uncaring. I feel less remorse for this than I should, I think. I try, but thats not enough sometimes. I sincerely do not care of other opinions and perspectives as default. I like to think im better at it now. I'm aware of it. But its still a problem

If I draw or write, what's my favourite of anything I created this year?

Im taking that to mean 2022. I guess this line from my fic A Cosmic Kiss?

Millenia ago, a comet had come to strike down the surface of the earth like a Holy hand clearing a table, and decimated all that had ever existed, and it had been the end of things. It had been the beginning. It had moved with the leisure of treacle towards its purpose in the indifferent void, but close, close, pulled into the orbit of the earth with speed to singe the atoms of air. Creation, by the guide of Destruction. Life, then Death, then Life again. Such was the way of things. Fires that last are the ones that waited. Paradoxes; sudden, and not. 

Such was their way.

It was the first thing that struck me to write the one shot, the one partially inspired by Puppet History, and would be the ongoing theme of the fic. Its quite good, i have to admit. Im glad the fic went over well.

Dogs or cats:

Cats. Nothing against a sweet puppy, but I prefer the chill leisure of your everyday feline thank you very much.

Something I would like to make content for:

All my fandoms. All of it. I write less than I honestly should; Sandman and Watcher and Good Omens and OFMD

Something I was excited about that turned out to dissappoint me:

*blinks* Oh God, i cant think of anything. Theres that book carnival, but it was a surprise, and it exceeded my poor memory and expectations, even if I didnt find what i was looking for. Hmm. If anything dissapointed me, it doesnt come to mind.

Hidden talent:

I have no idea ❤

Something I wish to have at this very moment:

A bite of chocolate. Maybe a cookie. But I'm broke enough to keep an eye out for the bank account and i cant afford such luxuries. Im even out of cocoa. Sigh.

Tagging @freddykicksasses @ennas-aesthetic @wannabecoyote @waistcoat35 @youre-platinum-pussycat

[fractoluminescence]

January 2024 Monthly Writing Wrap-Up

Originally posted to Dreamwidth on February 4th 2024

I don't really know how to start this, since it's my first time writing anything like it. I did make a first post when I created my journal, but this feels different - and while I have a habit of briefly journaling during my writing sessions, I rarely reflect on what I've accomplished beyond a couple of days back. I thought this would be as easy as any entry - but now that I'm here, I hesitate, I dread to look back - which is so unlike the writer part of me.

Well, here I am. And I've got a month of entries to go through, and a lot to say, so I'll be alright.

I've had several things going on this past month - as I usually do. What was new was the Dreamwidth account - I'd never used a traditional blogging platform before, so it took some adjusting. I took some time to figure out how the website worked - am still figuring it out, to be fair - and what I wanted to do with it, because it looked fun and wouldn't it be a shame to leave it be now that I have access to it. And wouldn't it be a good opportunity to have a neat archive of my writing journey - not a messy day-by-day journal like I have set up on Notion, and not the what-am-I-even-doing-with-these journal entries that I've got all over pretty much any account and paper journal that I use.

I guess I'll find out if it's meant to be soon enough.

GYWO is going well. I worked on my writing on 12 days in January - the minimum my pledge had me aiming for being 10 days. It's a good thing, of course - especially since I know there are months during which I tend to write significantly less, so (like November, ironically enough).

There are two writing projects I'm focusing on right now, the first of which is the story I'm writing for the IchiBowl event. It's a tough one for me - I'm not really used to writing short stories, because most of the stories I come up with instinctively are at least novella-length. It trips me up - there was no already-existing plunny I could use, and I've got a minimum of 5k words to write in a couple of months total, which is longer than the short stories I'm used to writing (when I write any at all). And I can't even tell if it's going well - I got myself into a bit of a pickle because I realized when I started the second scene that some of the themes and symbolism were reminiscent of Shakespeare's The Tempest, so I decided to take some time to read through it while taking notes. For inspiration purposes.

I had miscalculated how long this was going to take me, of course. It's early February though, and I'm finally done with it. I've still got roughly two weeks until the next check-in, so as long as I don't run into a wall of some kind (I always do, but most walls I can climb over fairly easily), things should go fairly smoothly.

The second project I've got ongoing - well, it's the first project out of the two really, becauseI've had it ongoing for years and it's been the love of my life - is whatever the fuck what I used to call Isolated has become. It was meant to be a single story - but now that I've learned to outline and I know it's SEVEN FREAKING BOOKS (probably), things have started making a lot more sense - and looking a lot more messy now that I know what a mess looks like.

That's where my writing progress this past month comes in - but first, some more context. I'm mostly focusing on the first book - or what I currently think of as the first book, the order may change since different books follow different characters - which I've temporarily titled You Only Die Twice (a title that has ironically come to downright contradict elements of the wider story since I first picked it). And I've been having this issue with it...See, originally - back when this story was meant to be one book, and was a crossover - back when its main character Lydia was as two-dimensional as a sheet of paper and the genre was supposed to be romance - back then, I introduced a subplot about the second lead. Or - I mean, I guess I'm not sure if he's the second lead in this particular volume anymore - maybe he is. At any rate, I introduced a subplot because of the crossover aspect - and when I removed that aspect just a couple of months into writing the story, I kept the subplot, because it was fun.

Yeah, except it didn't fit with the rest of the story at all. It didn't fit with the themes that the story developed over time - nor with the worldbuilding, nor with the character it was supposed to be centered around. I spent years trying to make it work - and a year or two trying to remove it, because it was starting to impede my story and made it so much harder to write. The worse part is, it didn't even have any impact on the rest of the books - but it had been there for so long, and was so deeply anchored in the whole original concept I had for YODT, that removing it was genuinely really hard.

Well, guess what. I've removed it. I've finally found a way of extirpating it from the story. It felt like removing a bunch of supporting beams, and now I've got holes to patch all throughout the 20 or so chapters I've already written, but I roughly know what to fill them with. And the character development for the second lead makes a lot more sense now. The story seems...so much more in harmony with itself - and with me. Now that it's removed, the pattern is re-knitting itself together in a way that works and it look so much better.

Other than that, I've worked on the worldbuilding for Isolated a bit. It's mostly just fanwanking, but this story specifically is too interlaced with the worldbuilding for me to take it lightly, lest I awkwardly tread on eggshells trying to make it make sense to the reader without revealing I have no idea what I'm doing.

In short, I've spent the month reading through The Tempest to get inspo for my story for the IchiBowl event, as well as figured out how to get rid of that one subplot that has been plaguing YODT for years. It has been a productive month.

[brucethewannabebard]

Hero of the Story

They say that everyone is the hero of their own story. Which when you look at what is meant by that phrase, is true. But I think the problem people have with is the use of the word “hero”. After all, I doubt many of us feel very heroic most days. I sometimes question if those we look to as heroes; whether current or historical, really saw themselves that way. I am sure at least some did. But I wonder how many felt like me. Like they were just muddling through this life as best they could, til they finally found something that moved them in a way that they had no choice but to act. 

Our civil rights leaders I imagine didn’t see themselves as heroes, but as common men and women who just couldn’t stand the thought of their kids having to fight because they didn’t. I like to think they knew it was important, but did any of them really walk in those crowds and consider themselves heroic? Or did they just see a wrong that needed to be right? What about the people who run towards disaster? The ones who charge into burning buildings, or a car crash, whether it is their job or not? Do all of them do it thinking they are going to be a hero? Surely at least some just did what they knew needed to be done. Or those people donating their time and effort to charities? As a collective they can accomplish wonderful things within the right organization, and really change the world. But when they lay down in bed at night do they feel like a hero?

People are all different, and so I am sure there are just as many who feel that way as don’t. But then there are several who probably feel they are who have done nothing to justify that feeling at all. I guess it is all about how you choose to view yourself. Maybe the problem is really that most people just don’t have a hero that they can relate to their own lives. For some people they have a close friend or family member that they would call a hero. But then if they do the same things that person did they tend to downplay themselves. Whether it be a father doing his best just like his dad before him, or an athlete who is an endless inspiration to others but looks up to his mom who always believed in him and took him to practice as a kid. Heroics can take on almost as many forms was there are people too, but we don’t always recognize them. Because in the stories everything has more context. 

When you watch a movie, or read a book, or experience a story in any other medium, we have the context of a beginning and end. We only get the parts that inform the character and plot. that reinforce themes.Many people go through trauma or events that they can parallel to the heroes, but without the clear vision of an outside observer. When we suffer we rarely see the virtue in the struggle that we love characters for getting through. We rarely view their suffering in the same way we see our own, and so we pretend that our overcoming it or ongoing battles with it somehow are not the same as the heroes. We also rarely if ever get a day to day. what those people were like outside of the high stress times. Even many of our histories of heroes have this same flaw. Painting them are great men and women, but some how forgetting to underline the fact that they were just men and women. Not gods, not super powered, not titans. Just people doing what they could. 

So yeah, I may not have done anything particularly heroic. I haven’t saved a life to my knowledge, nor have I gone out and changed the world. But maybe I am just not at the part of the story yet where I do the thing that makes me a hero. Maybe I am still in the early stages. Fordo wasn’t a hero to himself until the journey was complete and you could view all his effort with the context of his struggle. Even then he saw the virtue of others more than his own. All along the way he complained that he didn’t feel he was the right one for this, that he wishes it could be someone else, that it wasn’t like it was in the stories. But he was wrong. Because all a hero really does is keep going and trying. So maybe this last year of being beaten down, and broken and abandoned isn’t the proof that I am not good enough like I first thought. Maybe, just maybe, it is my darkest hour and nothing more. Maybe this suffering is just my time spent running from a spider in a cave with a treacherous wretch who wants to see me fail. And if that is the case, then maybe I just need to hold on long enough for my Sam to show up and help me finish the quest.

If I can do that, maybe then I can reach the end and come out the other side having done something worth living for. Probably not saving the entire world of men, but something more subtle. Something that when I do die, I can look back on and say “I did that”, and go without regret. 

[aroaceacacia]

hi! you dont have to answer this but i'm thinking of getting into lifesteal and i mean. considering my experience with the dsmp i don't know how well i would do having to watch 2 hour vods? so uh. i guess i'm just asking for a guide to be able to Steal the Life or whatever it is lifesteal fans do. stan planetlord I Think?

YIPPEE !!!!!

fun thing is you dont have 2 watch anything to just jump in! but if u want to heres a playlist of videos from season 3 and a much shorter playlist of videos from season 4 (the current, ongoing season). parrot also has some official playlists floating around somewhere for seasons 1 and 2. pick whatever strikes your fancy to watch!

if you want specific recommendations on my personal favorite s3 videos, heres my s3 highlights (which I havent updated in a while, & theres probably a few finales deserving of going on there).

if long VODs arent your thing but youd like to stay somewhat up to date with stream events, baconnwaffles0 is your go to guy! he takes a lot of inspiration from streamers like Ludwig & goes into each of his lifesteal streams with a Concept and a Plan for making into a video later. as a result hes gotten 12 second channel videos out of his season 4 escapades, very much a good short encapsulation of his season so far. (parrot also does this but parrot hasnt streamed super recently so his videos dont really reflect current events the way bacon's do.)

the streams are very much fun and will often give better insight into events as they happen - which is why makign sure they're preserved and saved is important - but streams are 100% not necessary to follow what happens, because lifesteal members explain everything important to you in narration. ls videos are very much designed to be accessible to any random person who might click on it and watch, so they will say nearly the same spiel about the hearts plugin every time, they'll describe their besties as just "my friend" instead of using proper nouns, give basic exposition of what side/team is which, etc. they want all of their videos to be able to do well independently of one another & that ideally any one of them could grab a new person! (they're algorithm bitches u know how it is)

... however if you DO want to watch livestreams, here are my recomendations:

princezam (twitch.tv/princezamlive)! zam is one of the most frequent streamers on the server & is I think the most accessible to newcomers. super funny & instantly endearing. we love printer!! i REALLY recommend his season 3 videos, especially "how I lost my empire"!

pangi is also up there (twitch.tv/pangilive) 👍 pangi is great, very funny guy, streams a ton - he'll be out until december tho bc hes currently recovering from a surgery! pangi is deceptively unassuming - man got the maximum number of hearts he could on the first day of season 4 and has refused to budge from that position since.

baconnwaffles0 (twitch.tv/baconnwaffles0) is teamed with planetlord and they're a frequent visitor in his streams, so if youd like to check out planet you're more likely to find him there than at their own twitch (twitch.tv/planetlord_) - but bacon and planet bounce off of each other super well. some of my favorite s4 streams have just been bacon, planet, and their teammate yeahjaron doing silly things, like making an exotic pets shop or reenacting the extinction event that killed the dinosaurs.

tl;dr in terms of "what homework do I need to do here to catch up", it's less like dream smp and more like hermitcraft. start wherever watch whatever nothing matters except that u have fun. fuck it we ball

[puddygeeks]

𝑾𝒂𝒓 𝑶𝒇 𝑯𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒔 - 𝑪𝒓𝒊𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒍 𝑴𝒊𝒏𝒅𝒔, 𝑺𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒓 𝑹𝒆𝒊𝒅 𝒙 𝑶𝑪 - 𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓 8: 𝑮𝒐𝒍𝒅𝒆𝒏 𝑶𝒑𝒑𝒐𝒓𝒕𝒖𝒏𝒊𝒕𝒚

Masterlist

Rating: Mature

Summary: 𝐴𝑙𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑟𝑒 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑓𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑜𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠. 𝑊𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝐴𝑈 𝑓𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑦, 𝑚𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑏𝑒𝑔𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑙 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑎𝑠𝑡.

Fandom: Criminal Minds

Pairing: Spencer Reid x OC

Status: Ongoing

LONG TERM ONGOING PROJECT :)

My writing is entirely fuelled by coffee! If you enjoy my work, feel free to donate toward my caffeine dependency: will work for coffee

𝑾𝒂𝒓𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒔: 𝐺𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑑𝑢𝑙𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡, 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑔𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑤. 𝑃𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑏𝑒 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠 𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛 𝑐𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑢𝑟𝑑𝑒𝑟, 𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑑 𝑎𝑏𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 & 𝑠𝑒𝑥𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑎𝑏𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝐴𝑈'𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘. 𝐼𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑦 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑙𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑖𝑠𝑠𝑢𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑓𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑠 𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑒, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑖𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑓𝑒𝑒𝑙 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑏𝑒 𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑎𝑔𝑒𝑑, 𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤.

Eᴘɪsᴏᴅᴇ: Pʀᴇ Sᴇᴀsᴏɴ 1

Chapter Eight

“You know, it’s remarkably similar to Brighton Pier here.” I commented, fanning myself in desperation under the scolding sun and Ricky pushed his large sunglasses down to allow me to feel the full force of his judgement. “Well, except that it’s unmistakably hotter, obviously.”

“How dare you compare this beautiful sandy bliss to your pebble filled nightmare?” He remarked with a sweeping hand gesture at the beach, before sipping out of his straw with offence and I rolled my eyes at him.

Ricky has always been a force to be reckoned with, but as he got older, he only grew more confident and I was constantly inspired by how comfortable he was in himself. His thick brunette hair reached his collarbones now, but he currently had it pushed back out of his face with a colourful bandana so that he could tan. In order for him to worship the sun to his full capacity, he was wearing a worryingly small pair of shorts and had stretched himself across a lounger like the diva that he absolutely was.

“Hmm. Your actual beach is better, I’ll give you that one. But you’re seriously lacking on drag queens, quirky cafes and fancy boutiques to shop in.” I pointed out, fondly recalling the whirlwind weekend that we’d spent in the British city the last time that he’d visited me and he shrugged in defeat.

“Touché. You win this round.” He admitted, laying back to bask himself again, whilst I shuffled my sensitive skin further under the sun umbrella that he’d reluctantly agreed to allow me to bring over on the condition that it didn’t cause a single shred of shade over him.

It was a beautiful day, only improved by the quality of my company and I had to admit that I was endlessly pleased to have decided to extend my stay for another few days. Despite the years that had passed since we had last been in each other's physical company, Ricky was still able to put me at ease in a way that no one else had ever been able to emulate and I cherished the opportunity to simply relax with him at the Virginia Boardwalk.

“So, what’s it like being an FBI agent?” Ricky asked, turning his attention back to me with a smug expression. “Is it wonderful knowing that you have the power to stop anyone in their tracks? I would absolutely abuse my power for evil, but I know you’re too pure for that.” He muttered with delight and I chuckled at him knowingly. The things that he would use an FBI badge to accomplish didn’t even bear thinking about.

“Darling. I already told you. I’m not an FBI agent. I’m still a technical analyst for Interpol. I’m just on loan.” I repeated, already losing count of how many times I had made this distinction, but he still seemed as unconvinced by this as he was the first time that I told him.

“Oh, semantics! Sounds to me like you’re working for them and considering that you saved a girl from a burning building like a freaking hero, I’m just going to treat you like one.” He argued, seeming amused as if I were simply downplaying things, when realistically, it was a case of him dramatising the arrangement, as he did with most things. “We have an FBI agent in the family. That’s pretty cool.”

“There is absolutely no reasoning with you.” I groaned, shaking my head in embarrassment and he shrugged dismissively, as if this were an obvious fact that I should have accepted already. “How’s university going? Have you sorted your accommodation for your second year yet?”

“College is going fine. I’ve done a fantastic job being the life of the party, so I have plenty of offers for people to live with. My only struggle is choosing people who aren’t completely filthy as housemates. I can’t live in a grubbly little student hovel.” He explained, seeming repulsed by the very idea and I raised a brow at his diva attitude. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not being dramatic. My first year in dorms, I shared a bathroom with straight men. You don’t understand the trauma that I’ve lived through.”

“Does your mother know that you haven’t arranged housing yet?” I interrogated, already sensing a hint of dishonesty in him and his features quickly contorted into a guilty look. “Rituparan! I understand being picky, but you’ll end up with no choice other than to live with the grimy jocks if you don’t hurry up. You need to get organised.” I scolded, earning an eye roll so severe that I worried his face might never recover from the strain.

“Don’t get your panties in a twist, Alley Cat. I’ll get it sorted. Now, drink your mocktail before it gets too diluted.” He ordered, sipping down the last of his drink and placing the little umbrella from the top in his hair with a flourish. The moment that he faced me, I knew that he had mischief in mind.

“Okay. Are you ready? Who am I?” He pouted so dramatically that his cheeks all but disappeared and I almost choked on my drink.

“Oh, too easy! That is the unforgettable Lola, the only woman on the planet who considers a cocktail umbrella the perfect hair accessory for any occasion.” I answered, earning a cheer and wicked laugh of satisfaction from him. “You know, I love having someone else to mock dad’s exes with. You’d think the fact that he only dates women my age would mean we’d have something in common, but alas, apparently a sense of humour isn’t shared by age group.”

“Of course they’re not funny! The only thing those girls come with is a price tag.” He sassed, flipping his hair back out of his face in a ridiculously bitchy gesture and I was immediately reminded of just how much I loved him. “At least you don’t have to pretend to like Tanya anymore. Honestly, if she had a second brain cell, she’d be dangerous.”

“Oh, no! They broke up?” I gasped, almost sounding convincing with my upset and he whipped his head around with drastic confusion. “I guess she had to bleed my dad dry of pocket money eventually.” I drawled, prompting a small yelp of surprise and a quick high five from Ricky.

Tanya had been dating my dad for just over six months now, so I knew that she was likely to be approaching her expiration date soon. His routine was well known amongst the entire family now and in an effort to counter the embarrassment that it caused for my mother and I, it had become a running joke for us all to share.

“Didn’t you hear the details?” Ricky crooned, turning to face me fully on his lounger with a devious expression and I shrugged nonchalantly. “According to Maji, she tried to charge her lip fillers to his business credit card. Caused all sorts of uproar at the office. I guess she’ll be making that duck face at someone else’s wallet now.” He divulged, pouting into an exaggerated model face for effect and I struggled not to splutter my drink everywhere in response.

Ricky’s mother always seemed to know everything that was happening in our family and I’d long believed that this was where he’d learned to dig information out of people. She was abnormally gifted in guilt tripping the truth out of even the most hardened family members and yet, she doted on Ricky as if he was the very thing that made her world turn. If I ever wanted to know what was going on in my dad’s life, I knew that I could rely on her to be up to date with events.

Before I could manage to recover enough to speak, my mobile rang with it’s sharp tone and I had to clamber around in my bag to find it. As soon as I saw the private number, my eyes grew wide in dread.

“Oh, no! The bat phone?” Ricky asked, seeming genuinely horrified that I might be called into work and I quickly nodded, before holding a finger to my lips to shush him.

“Agent Hawthorne.” I answered, feeling utterly ridiculous referring to myself this way in my current company. This insecurity was only made worse by Ricky sliding his shades back on in a judgemental manner and I gestured to him to stop distracting me.

“Alice. This is Hotch. Are you still in Virginia?”

The voice on the other end of the phone was as serious as ever and though I was enormously relieved to find that it wasn’t anyone from Interpol trying to order me home, I felt nerves building in my chest already.

“Yes, Sir. I am.” I reported, noticing Ricky raising his brows at me in interest and I knew that he was dying to know what was being said.

“I realise that you’re spending time with family, but would you be able to come into the office for a meeting? I have a matter that I would like to discuss with you in person, if possible.” Hotch requested, allowing me absolutely no hint of the cause for this meeting and I felt my face change into one of alarm.

My mind had already begun racing with all of the possible complications that I could be facing for my actions at the base now that all of the documentation for the case had been submitted and I was terrified that if any further charges were brought against me, they could contradict the deal that I made with Interpol to avoid imprisonment.

“Yes, Sir. I’ll come in right away.” I stuttered, attempting to fight down my terror. My hands shook with nerves as I hung up on the call and Ricky looked positively thrilled to have been given the opportunity to witness this conversation, as if he’d just been personally included in a matter of national security.

“It’s a good thing that you went for virgin cocktails, my dear. I have to get back to Quantico.” I confessed, quickly burying my nerves so that he wouldn’t sense trouble.

“Oh my god! This is so exciting!” He announced, hopping straight to his feet and flustering to grab his belongings that were spread across every surface around him. “One cab for Agent Hawthorne, coming right up!”

--⥈--

Outfit: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/460070918191621506/

Standing in the lift of the Quantico building, I was overwhelmed with anxiety. I had been in such a rush to get here that it hadn’t even crossed my mind to change clothes, or to do anything to prepare my appearance at all. Though I knew that I didn’t have any more office clothes with me anyway, I acknowledged that I could at least have found something that provided a little more coverage and didn’t leave me feeling so exposed.

The idea of walking through an office where everyone was dressed smartly, wearing a white floral mini dress was an absolute nightmare and I realised that I only had a few minutes to make any changes. All I could think to do was to untie my waist length hair, shaking it out to at least cover some of my arms and attempting to make it look styled.

The doors opened to reveal a full office, with most of the team present at their desks and I gulped nervously. My dress felt as if it had actually shrunk in size since the beach now that I would be seen in it by people that I had worked with and I had to remind myself that I had bigger things to worry about with being called to come here than my attire.

JJ’s heels clicked on the polished floor as she entered the reception, her professional appearance clashing horribly with the casual style of my low top converses and I tried not to feel intimidated.

“Alice! I know that I said we wanted to see you again soon, but this is a little crazy.” She breezed as she approached me with a warm smile and I tried to force myself to relax. “Hotch is just finishing a call and he’ll be out to meet you.” She explained, before her gaze fell onto my outfit and I felt myself physically become stiff under her scrutiny. “You look pretty!”

“Oh, thanks. I was just on the beach. I’ve already worn all of my work clothes so, um, this is all I have?” I offered, shifting awkwardly and she smiled sympathetically at me.

“We’ve all been called in at unexpected times. I was literally collected from home in my pajamas once. You’ve got nothing to worry about.” She soothed, leaning closer to me as she spoke so that no one would overhear my concern and I let out a long breath in relief.

“Besides, I know that Hotch is just going to appreciate you being able to come in at such short notice. I hope you got to enjoy at least a little bit of your time off before we intruded?” She asked with an honest concern in her eyes and just as I opened my mouth to see if she could give me even the slightest hint of what to expect, Hotch stepped into the room.

“Alice. Thank you for coming so quickly.” He stated in his usual serious manner, reaching straight to shake my hand and I complied immediately, forcing a smile through my nerves. “I’ll try not to take up too much of your time. Let’s talk in my office.” He offered, opening the glass doors to the main office for me and I stepped through hesitantly.

Within approximately two steps of entering the space, I could already feel eyes on me and tried not to allow myself to be unnerved by the attention. The anxious voice in the back of my mind screamed that I was the most inappropriate looking member of staff to ever enter this office, but I forced myself to keep my head held high as Ricky had always preached.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that Spencer was watching me from his desk as if he’d been stopped in his tracks and I waved subtly at him, prompting him to hurriedly do the same back in a fluster. Morgan passed Hotch distractedly, before he noticed that I was following him with obvious surprise.

“Looking good, Poppins. Welcome back.” He muttered as he squeezed beside me, sneaking a charming smile and thanks to the combined warmth of the two men, once again I felt my nerves beginning to settle slightly.

Hotch encouraged me to take a seat in his office, before closing the door behind us and I felt as if I couldn’t think straight in the silence that followed. He settled into the seat opposite me, knitting his hands together on the desk between us and despite feeling before that I had reached the point where I could understand his expressions, his face at this moment was completely unreadable.

“For a start, I want to discuss what happened at the Twenty Nine Palms base.” He opened, his stern eyes studying my face for every minute reaction and though my heart sank at the suggested topic, I nodded back calmly.

“Whilst it can’t be denied that your actions resulted in saving a young girl's life, they were also unacceptably reckless. You demonstrated absolutely no regard for your own safety and jeopardised the reputation of the whole team. You are aware that we appreciate your support, but I’m not convinced that you realise we are legally and morally responsible for your wellbeing whilst you are under our service and that I would be personally held accountable for your death as a result of your irresponsible actions.” He lectured, his voice sounding even more severe than it had when I was in the ambulance and I felt my confidence crumbling with every word that he spoke.

It became clear that he had paused his speech to allow me the chance to explain myself and I cleared my throat to speak with a feeling of terror.

“I’m truly sorry for my actions, Sir. You are entirely right. I was reckless and selfish, and I didn’t consider how my behaviour would reflect on your team, and especially on you. I’m not going to make excuses. I just want you to know that I accept any and all consequences that you feel are appropriate.” I answered calmly, ensuring that I kept my tone calm and respectful, and he sighed as he studied me.

“I didn’t call you in here to punish you, Alice. This is a conversation, not a lecture. What I aim to understand is why an agent with no field experience, or any personal stake in the case, felt that they had no choice other than to risk their own life to save a child who they’d never met?” He clarified, his entire demeanour remaining unchanged even as he moved to a gentler tactic of questioning and I chewed on my lip.

It took a few moments for me to consider how best to answer this, but eventually I decided that I respected this team as a whole too much to lie. I prepared myself for a conversation that I knew would likely change his opinion of me permanently, but assured myself that honesty was a necessity at this point.

“When I was fifteen years old, my mother was abducted.” I began, glancing down at my hands as I spoke to avoid the intensity of his gaze. “It took four months for her to be found and when she came home, she was a different person. I never saw the mother that went missing again.” I paused, clearing my throat to keep the emotion from my voice before continuing.

“Three years later, a girl at my university went missing. She wasn’t the first, but the stakes were high as all of the others had been found murdered. I obsessed over everything that my mother had survived to come home and I couldn’t imagine how awful it would be to endure that at just eighteen years old. So, I began looking into the case and after a while of digging, I compiled enough information to anonymously assist law enforcement in safely recovering the missing girl. I realised then that I had the skills to make a difference to the world and I kept going, one missing person at a time, until Interpol found me.”

“You were given a choice between conviction, or working for them?” Hotch asked knowingly, as if he’d seen this very situation many times before and I recalled the recent conversation that I’d had with Penelope about hackers frequently being recruited through their questionable activities. I nodded slowly in response, deciding that this wasn’t the time to divulge any further information about the circumstances of my hiring.

“I didn’t join this field by choice. It was never the plan for my life. Don’t get me wrong, I always wanted to help people. I actually trained to become a psychiatrist, like my dad, but a job like this had never even been on my radar. Yet, here I am.” I explained, shrugging awkwardly as I realised that this sounded like I was ungrateful for the mercy that I was shown and I tried to be more careful with my wording when I spoke again.

“When I was standing in front of that building, watching the smoke pour out of it, all I could think about was how my mother told me that she spent every minute of every day that she was in captivity praying to come home. I could just imagine Amanda doing the same thing, hoping with everything she had that someone would save her and I was right there.” I stopped as frustration seeped into my voice, allowing myself to regain control so that I could resume my explanation.

“I knew that there was a chance that she was still alive and I felt like everything that had happened, all of the crazy unplanned situations that had led me to being there at that exact time were so that I could save her. It sounds insane, but it was like my legs moved before I had even decided what I was going to do. For the first time in my career, I trusted my team, this team to have my back and with all due respect, Sir, it was the right thing to do.” I finally finished my rant, forcing myself to meet his eyes to allow him to see my sincerity and I was shocked to find that his face was filled with understanding, causing me to realise that he was already filling in the blanks between my words.

“You said that this was the first time that you felt this way about your team. You shouldn’t be working with people that you can’t rely on. In our line of work, we are forced to face horrors that most people can’t even begin to imagine. The people around you should be your anchor in the storm.” Hotch advised, causing my eyes to become watery and I sniffed back my emotions, desperate not to cry in front of him. “You have options, Alice.”

“What options? Prison?” I scoffed, recalling my conversation with Shepard with a flinch.

Though I had thought in detail about leaving Interpol many times since my recruitment, I knew in a serious light that it was merely a fantasy and nothing more. Without my employment to them, I was considered as nothing more than a threat to security and returning to normal civilian life was no longer something that I could consider.

“Join our team.” Hotch offered, causing my mouth to drop open in shock and I noticed the corners of his lips twitch slightly upward at my reaction.

“It’s clear that you are neither happy, nor valued at Interpol. You have already proven the difference that you could make across multiple cases and the entire team have agreed that you make an excellent addition.” He elaborated, listing reasons that I struggled to even associate with myself and I couldn’t seem to form a response, as I stuttered in the silence.

“But, I-Sir, we just discussed how I jeopardised this team. I don’t mean to seem rude, or ungrateful because I absolutely am not, but I fail to see how I’ve given you the impression that I would make a suitable field agent. You already have Penelope for technical support, so I’m not sure what else you could need me for here.” I pointed out, hardly able to wrap my head around the sudden detour that this conversation had taken and found myself baffled at the very concept of him offering to employ me.

“When your team brought you for the Valeno case, you showed potential that they were purposefully dismissive of. After you left, Gideon suggested that I speak to you about a position within the BAU. Unfortunately, at the time we didn’t have the available resources to do this. Due to the recent successes of this team, we’ve been granted the budget to expand and I would be foolish to ignore a candidate who has already contributed to that success. You are a good fit and the first choice of every member in this unit.” He presented, completely disregarding my concerns and when I looked at him with confusion, he sighed.

“I have discussed the recent incident with Gideon and we share the opinion that with the correct mentoring and the support of a team that believes in your worth, you could be an exceptional field agent.” He divulged, causing me to raise my brows impossibly higher in surprise.

It was bizarre enough that Hotch wanted me to join the team, but finding out that Gideon had been the instigator for this offer blew what remained of my psyche to pieces and Hotch cleared his throat to regain my attention from my inner turmoil.

“The offer would, of course, be conditional. It would be based on your own commitment to overcoming your experiences. None of us are immune to personal biases and each of us have elements of our pasts that make certain cases more challenging for us than the others. However, we rely on each other to hold us accountable, and have all learned to be objective and to know our limits. If you think this is something that you can also undertake, then there is a place here for you. As long as you want it.” Hotch clarified, causing me to stare back at him in blatant disbelief.

“I-I honestly don’t know what to say.” I stuttered, fiddling with my hair anxiously and Hotch cracked a rare smile at me. “It isn’t as simple for me as just changing state. My life is in France now. I’ve already left my mum behind once in England. I’d also have to renounce my dual nationality and become an American citizen.” I thought aloud, considering the enormity of the decision before me and Hotch nodded in understanding.

“Can I have some time to think about it?” I asked nervously, unsure of what else to say and Hotch seemed completely unsurprised by my reaction, as if he’d actually been expecting it.

“Of course. It’s a serious decision that you aren’t expected to make right away. Take all of the time that you need.”

--⥈--

“Girl. Your life is crazy!” Ricky gasped, studying me with a fascinated expression and I had to laugh at his dramatic reaction, despite mostly agreeing with the sentiment. “You’re gonna say yes, right?”

I sighed deeply as I considered this question and the way that he considered me now revealed exactly how insane he thought I was for even needing to think about it. In order to avoid his prying eyes, I stood to start clearing away the takeaway boxes that littered my hotel room bed, but Ricky refused to be silenced.

“Alice. Honey. What are you doing?! Life at Interpol has been miserable for you since day one. You said it yourself. I can’t imagine anything there that could be worth turning this offer down for!” He scolded, staring at me in complete disbelief and I shook my head at his youthful attitude to things.

“It’s more complicated than that. I never planned to work in this sector at all, much less as an FBI agent!” I explained, still struggling to process the fact that this was even an option that was open to me. It felt as if it had come from nowhere and I was already overwhelmed with the mere concept of making such a serious life decision.

“This isn’t just a job that we’re talking about here. It’s a completely different life. I need to be sure that I can handle it, before I move away from everything that I know. I’d hardly ever get to see mum and Roger.” I clarified, struggling to make him understand the severity of the situation.

“You never visit your mama anyway! I should know. I overhear Maji talking to her about it enough.” He groaned, only causing me to feel even worse about the idea of moving even further away from her.

“Besides, if you took it then you’d be living right near me and there isn’t any better benefit than that!” He added, posing across the bed as if he were the most important factor in the proposal and I chuckled at him with fondness. He sighed at my lack of enthusiasm, before dropping to a more serious tone.

“The most important thing for all of us is your happiness. You’d be crazy to stay somewhere that is making your whole existence taste like bad Aloo Gobi. And you deserve better than that! You deserve for your life to always be like Maji’s cooking, full of love and happiness.” He described, seeming as if he’d distracted himself along the way and he glanced back down at his plastic container of curry with disdain.

“You realise that you have a gift for being able to relate literally anything to food, right?” I remarked playfully, observing him with amazement and he shrugged carelessly.

“Food is one of the most enjoyable things that sustains us. It’s important.” He argued passionately and I couldn’t think of a single point to dispute his statement with, having to allow him the pleasure of being correct. “Fortunately, Mumbai Gardens is able to provide an almost authentic experience, right here in the heart of Virginia. A good meal can heal many things, you know. Even the stress of your biggest ever life decision.”

“That’s high praise coming from you. Could it pass the home test though, do you think?” I queried with curiosity as I disposed of the remaining trash with the Mumbai Gardens logo on it and he scoffed as if I’d asked something utterly ridiculous.

“Not a chance! Even Mama would be able to tell you that it wasn’t completely correct. You know, she’s actually been with Maji long enough now to have better cooking taste than some of my other actual Indian friends.” He revealed, showing his love for his step mom, who happened to be my paternal aunt Heather, clear in his voice.

I couldn’t withhold a wide grin as I thought of my aunts, both filled with a warmth that radiated even in my memories. Heather and Ricky’s mum, Nabhitha, had been married for almost ten years now and were the main reason that I still had any faith in true love. They had done an admirable job of raising Ricky together, with Heather always treating him as if he was her biological son and I was endlessly proud of them. Thanks to them, Ricky had grown into the confident, funny teenager that I loved. Their blissful blended family gave me hope for my own future.

“I just had an idea.” Ricky breezed, sitting up particularly straight as if he could barely contain his enthusiasm and I turned back to face him with interest. “If you take this job, we could totally rent a place together! I could be your stylist extraordinaire, in-house councillor and professional Indian chef.” He suggested, his eyes gleaming with excitement and I scoffed loudly at the idea.

“Absolutely not. I’ve already got enough on my plate, without considering parenting you, Ricky.” I laughed, wincing at even the thought of dealing with his dramatics on a daily basis and he gasped at my refusal, seeming as if he could never have expected me to refuse his generous offer. “You can be as offended as you like, but I still don’t have the energy to deal with a college kid in my space. I’m not gonna be your easy way out of student housing. Pick some other teenagers to live with already.”

“Fine. I was offering you a lifestyle of sheer luxury, but I guess I’ll just have to take my fabulous self somewhere that I’ll be better appreciated.” He announced, acting as if he were hurt by my denial, before quickly softening back into a smile barely a few seconds later. “You should definitely think some more about taking the job though, queen. You deserve a fresh start.”

“We’ll see.” I conceded with a chuckle, desperate to simply end the conversation. “Now, which film do you want to rent?”

[drimareuniverse]

Looking for a creative writer/storyteller

Hello! I'm Jay, I'm a non-binary artist and I'm looking for a creative writer that can help me write stories for my pet project Drimare Universe! Particularly my Webcomic and Visual Novel.

More details below, all help and sharing is appreciated!

The Drimare Universe is a world located within the dreams of humans, and the Drimare are its main inhabitants spread through various different regions.

It's composed of smaller stories focused on specific groups of characters (Like how Marvel has Spider-man stories, Iron-man stories, etc.) The general tone is a fun modern fantasy slice of life type.

I've been working on the project on my own for the past 10 years, and although I have a lot of lore and character info written down, when it comes to writing stories themselves, my skills are lacklustre. I finally accepted that I need someone that could help me with that, so here I am!

I keep most of the character info and lore archived on its wiki here if you're curious to learn more about it.

My current two projects that I'm looking for help on are a Webcomic and a Visual Novel, both of which are on hiatus because of my difficulty and general dissatisfaction with my own writing :(

I basically have loose plot points, certain scenarios, conversations and ideas, and I need someone that can tie those things together in a satisfying narrative way.

You don't have to work on the comic AND visual novel, but I am looking for help in at least one of those projects.

General requirements

Be over 18 years old. I'm 23 and not comfortable working with minors.

Be LGBTQ+ friendly! A LOT of the cast is LGBTQ in some way and certain characters focus a lot on topics of gender and sexuality so the more you know about the topic, the better :)

Have the patience to learn about my characters and world's quirks and lore lol! I'll try to explain things as best as I can! Bonus points if you have weird ideas yourself.

Basically, you write, I give my input, and then we use the finished script for the comic and/or visual novel.

You will be credited!

As for rates, my budget is small so let me know how much you charge! I'm somewhat of a writer myself and I don't feel comfortable having someone work for free, but I also have no idea what people usually charge for stuff like this. I can also offer my art in exchange if the person is interested/comfortable with that! Examples are on my DeviantArt as well as other links found on my profile.

I'm looking for someone I can work with for the long term so expect me to be a returning client if I enjoy your work! :) Ideally, I'd like to make a team eventually, but a writer is the priority atm.

I don't really have a set deadline so don't worry about having to finish things by specific dates.

It's my first time trying to commission someone for writing so I apologize if my etiquette is off, I'm only experienced in art commissions. I have no idea how I'm supposed to commission writing so I'll just describe what I'm looking to get below.

For the webcomic

Drimare Universe is the first official webcomic series based around the world of Drimare Universe, focusing on the origin story of the two siblings Zelly and Blade, as well as other characters they meet throughout their journey. It's set roughly around 10 years before the current timeline.

Available to read on Tapas here

It's an origin story for two siblings, followed by episodic stories of them meeting other characters from the cast and learning about the world around them. It's sort of built like a cartoon show, with more serious episodes, others more light-hearted, some important one, etc.

There are only 13 pages in the first episode so far, but I'm unhappy with the current script for the rest of the story and need help with it.

I'd like for someone who is actually good at writing and having better ideas to give it a look and either suggest things that could work better or straight-up rewrite it from scratch but better

The other episodes only have the general main plot points written down, with further episodes still being in a draft phase (I got so caught up with my writer's block with trying to figure the first two episodes, that I haven't been able to focus on the following ones)

***

For the visual novel

Drimare Universe Friendsim, is an ongoing Visual Novel project that will feature various characters from the Drimare Universe series, it is currently being developed on Ren'Py and free to download on the DU Friendsim itch.io page.

It is heavily inspired by games like Hiveswap Friendship Simulator as it follows a similar concept of a Human protagonist meeting various cast characters in order to form friendships with them.

The series will be released in various volumes, each one focusing on a specific character, with the events changing depending on the player's choices.

Available to download for free on Itch.io

It's about a human dreamer character who wakes up in the dream world and meets respective Drimare characters.

If you've played Hiveswap Friendsim or Pesterquest, it's the exact same concept. YCH protag meets characters in a very Isekai inspired scenario. It's like a dating sim, but friendship focused instead.

Unlike the webcomic, which takes place in the past, this visual novel takes place in the current timeline. Also unlike the comic, the visual novel is not canon.

Each volume is focused on MC (Who is referred to as "Dreamer") meeting a specific character, with other secondary characters making appearances as well.

There are two volumes available so far, each composed of one short story.

The tone is playful and comedic, I guess "quirky" could be a word to describe it. But still capable of having its serious moments,

Each volume has three endings. A short bad ending, a neutral ending, and a good/true ending. (The length and amount of endings can be flexible)

You don't have to know how to program visual novels or anything like that, I just need help with the stories. I'll be in charge of adding the writing to the game, animating the sprites accordingly, etc etc.

Apologies for the long text, I just want to be sure people understand exactly what I'm looking for! Ideally, I'd love to find someone that could share my passion for creating content for this project, but for now, I'll just settle for just finding someone at all lol

You can contact me through PMs here, though I also accept messages through Twitter DMs or Discord!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/NE0Nbandit

Discord - Jay 🌸🌊#9625

Thank you for taking the time to read this! <3

[jamgrlsblog]

2020 Fic Roundup

When I started 2020, I had no idea I would write as much as I did! I was starting my first Ineffable Wives fic, which became a theme of the year 😂. When I finished District of (un-)Certainty in 2019, I thought that would be my last idea (except for a sequel I started and never finished: whoops). Instead, I completed 8 fics and 2 podfics and wrote a little more than half of an ongoing WIP I still haven’t finished. That’s a total of 11 works listed under 2020 on AO3! (And 130k words.) Here’s a roundup ☺️.

Peaches, Apples, and Other Forbidden Fruit (Fic & Podfic) 

55k, E

This was my first wives fic and started with a prologue that just popped into my head one night. I really wanted to write about what it was like to be a woman, with all those little vanities and insecurities that complicate self image, and with a deep connection to classic books about women influencing and shaping how she might interact with the world. And then I made it Southern and threw Aziraphale into a sorority with Crowley 😂. And it became about internalized biphobia and about unlearning biases and about love formed of long time friendship and deep knowing.

I decided to podfic it as I was writing because I wrote Crowley as dyslexic and I decided, out of honor for her, to make a more accessible version of the fic 😅. This was a total whim- I had no idea what I was getting into, but boy did I learn on the job! I read the entire fic in a Southern accent and had a lot of fun. I also drove my spouse crazy because I made him stay quiet while I was recording, but he bought me a “how to podcast” book for Christmas, so maybe you’ll get more podfic in the future 😉.

I made friends, thanks to this fic, including @miss-minnelli and @tawnyontumblr, who I can’t imagine not knowing now! I also made friends with @leoswork, who made 3 art pieces inspired by this fic, which I am still amazed by!

Oil Paint Stains

498 words, G

This was written for a “Name that Author” game in the Good Omens Events discord server and was such fun! I hardly knew anyone at that time and threw myself in anyways. It was a great way to get started making friends and a great little challenge to write a fic under 500 words! This, I think, is when I firmly established myself as a Wives writer 😂. 

Class Action

500 words, M

Listen, this was another “Name that Author” game, and I wanted to try a new pairing to change things up (I knew if I wrote wives again, I would be known) and I wanted to try writing exactly 500 words as an extra challenge. I didn’t know I would post it. I certainly didn’t know it would have the most kudos of 2020. Literally just a silly Warlock/Adam thing.

Strawberries Aren’t Forbidden (Fic & Podfic) 

8k, E

This is a companion piece to Peaches, Apples, and Other Forbidden Fruit about just how Crowley was doing all that time that Zira was pining 😂 (hint: she was also pining). Writing this on the side tempered my writing of the first fic by helping me remember how Crowley was feeling the whole time! This is pretty angsty, tbh, but we’ve got a fun and happy ending. I podficced this because I had to to keep with the first one! This one is in Crowley’s valley girl accent (aka, mostly just how I usually talk 😅.)

Summer Swims and Strings

5k, M

I wrote this for @suvroc as part of the Wives October gift exchange. This was my first exchange and I was so nervous about my giftee liking it! I really enjoyed writing reconnected lovers. The general tone and feel of this fic was heavily influenced by Folklore, which I was very into when writing this, so we’ve got a calm, reflective, and full of love lakeside fic!

Frights and Feelings

4k, T

This one was for @sk3tchid, also for the Wives gift exchange! I got to do something spooky and Halloweeny, which I was thrilled about. I took a big risk with this fic- I wrote two stories in one fic. I decided “ooh, what if they are watching a spooky movie!” so I could somehow fit spooky and cozy homey feels in one fic. And it worked? I guess 😂. Regardless, it was lots of fun!

cowgirl like me

6k, T

This fic started as me shouting about Evermore on the Wives discord server and I happened to mention that cowboy like me was giving me ineffable spouses feels, and being on the wives server, I got the response of wives? Wives! And I was like, nah, I don’t have time. And then I thought, well, and I wrote this fic over the course of one weekend. @tawnyontumblr made it readable 😂.

lover

4k, T

This was a companion to cowgirl like me. I had just gotten married and was having feels about Crowley and the late husband I invented for the first fic (which is Eric the Disposable Demon! So cute!) and also feels about marriage in general. So I wrote this little vignette thing, and my first f/m fic! I didn’t think anyone would read it, but @tawnyontumblr encouraged me to write it anyways ☺️. She really made this readable. I gave her a skeleton of a fic that she encouraged me to actually flesh out!

Star of the Wooded Mountain

WIP, 46k+, T

Listing this one last, even though it was 4th to start posting and the 2nd to start writing. I started posting this in June!! I actually believed that I would be able to write and post my entire summer camp fic during the summer and it would be like “ooh, seasonally appropriate!”. Lol. I’ve got 6/10 chapters up currently.

This is part of the Good AUmens event and how I was introduced to the Good Omens Events discord server!! I’m so glad I signed up for this event because this server has become such a huge part of my life and has been a place where I’ve made so many friends!

I signed up for the event saying I was going to write a wives fic, as was my 2020 theme. But when I actually sat down to write, I started writing Crowley as a non-binary/agender character instead. This fic became an exploration of gender and identity and navigating early adulthood. I met @parmejeannecheese thanks to this fic, who stepped up, never having sensitivity read before, and has put so much time and thought into helping me with this fic. I cannot overstate how amazing they are and how lucky I was to find them. 

I have learned so much writing this fic!! And it has become so much bigger and better than I could have imagined. I’m excited to keep posting this one into 2021 ☺️.

And that’s all my fics of 2020! I hope some of you have enjoyed them or might enjoy them in the future! Here’s to what may come in 2021! Maybe I’ll write a husbands fic again one day? Literally wrote none in 2020 😂.

[jeremystrele]

Connecting With The Past + Grappling With History, With Painter Mia Boe

Connecting With The Past + Grappling With History, With Painter Mia Boe

Studio Visit

by Sasha Gattermayr

Mia’s new Brunswick studio is filled with light, and is the perfect space to continue on her growing portfolio of work. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

A painting from her recent catalogue sits on the mantle. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

Butchalla-Burmese artist Mia Boe in her light-filled studio. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

Mia paints full time and volunteers for The Torch in her spare time. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

One of Mia’s works in progress.

Mia’s paintings are vibrant and narrative-driven, which means she does a lot of her own historical research. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

Left: Mia is inspired by figures in art history like Albert Namatjira, Sidney Nolan and Russell Drysdale; and figures from history such as Eliza Fraser, Ned Kelly and the Queensland Native Police. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files. Right: ‘Stripes 3’ by Mia Boe.

A selection of work Mia recently sold in her latest catalogue and has prepared for prize entries. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

Her elongated, distended figures are always in the landscape and often accompanied by food, animals or spirits. Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

You can see the Sidney Nolan influence in this composition! Photo  – Amelia Stanwix for The Design Files.

The historical and contemporaneous imprisonment of First Nations people is a continuous theme in Mia’s work. Patterns and vibrant colour create tension between the political context and the composition.

Watching Mia Boe’s rise to cult status is almost giving me whiplash. The Brisbane-raised, Melbourne-based artist has grown a dedicated following in the 18 months since she’s really begun concentrating on her painting – and it’s only going up. To give you an indication of just how devoted her audience are, her recent catalogue of nine paintings sold out in under two minutes.

Mia studied art history before last year, when Melbourne’s sweeping lockdowns gave her the time (and a good excuse!) to focus on her art. But it’s not just Instagram fans who are hot on her tail. With a residency at the Museum of Brisbane, commissions for Craft Victoria and Brisbane’s Institute of Modern Art, two group shows and a solo exhibition (titled Black Devil) at Open Space Collective under her belt since the beginning of 2020, it’s evident that Mia has well and truly caught the attention of the nation’s arts community.

But the institutions aren’t everything. When she’s not painting, Mia volunteers at The Torch – an organisation that aids First Nations prisoners and ex-prisoners with their art practices.

Art is the past, present and future for Mia – storytelling is her mode of being. Hear it in her own words.

How did you arrive at your current painting style? Has it evolved slowly over time or always been somewhat similar?

One clear continuity in my style has been that I tend to populate my landscapes with strangely elongated figures, whose bodies are also sometimes bloated and distended. I guess also that female figures in my work are representations, approximately, of myself, so a lot of my works could also function as self-portraits. But when I start a painting, I’m not always conscious of who the figure is, though if I’m painting black figures, they’re probably members of my family.

Also, I sometimes add larger figures with little detail, or floating in the landscape — these figures are representations of spirits. They represent family members that have died, and are a marker of the family that I will never get to know because of the repercussions of colonisation. I also try and experiment with colour: inspired by the ubiquitous blues of Robert Owen’s recent exhibition at Heide, I’ve recently been trying to control and limit my palette.

Do you use your art to connect with history or grapple with it?

Probably a bit of both. I’m especially interested in the histories of my family’s cultural heritages. My mum is a descendent of the Butchulla people, but she was only told by my grandmother that she was Aboriginal when she was in her teens (my grandmother was worried she’d have her children taken away from her if she was open about it). My Dad moved to Australia as a refugee from Burma when he was a young child.

My art practice has allowed me to research these twin histories, and to track the consequences of British colonisation in both Australia and Burma. (Burmese historian Thant Myint-U’s recent The Hidden History of Burma is an amazing book for people interested in learning more about Burma.) I hope soon to be able to spend some time looking at concrete connections between the colonial occupations of Australia and Burma. Empire, after all, makes the world smaller — it’s big project, I think, is to remake the margins in the image of the centre — so I’m sure there are some connections to be found (white officers, for instance, might have trained in Burma before coming to Australia, or vice versa).

Anyway, I definitely use my art to think through history: sometimes head-on, sometimes obliquely.

How do you involve historical references in your pieces?

I make sure that I’ve done proper research into a subject before making work about historical events. At the start of the year I showed my first exhibition in Brisbane. It was called Black Devil, and the works responded, from multiple angles, to the history of the Queensland Native Police: an exterminationist outfit which consisted of Aboriginal troopers led by white officers, and which aimed to wipe out resistance to colonisation.

The Native Police was active from 1848 to c. 1905 and were estimated to have killed over 44,000 Murris in those 50+ years. The fact that many of the massacres of Aboriginal people were carried out by Aboriginal troopers, who were themselves often kidnapped as boys, and barracked hundreds of kilometres from their kin and ancestral lands, pointed up for me the ongoing violence and infernal strategies of division which colonialism employs.

During research for this exhibition I found out that my ancestor, my great-great-grand uncle Wonamutta, a Butchulla man from K’gari (Fraser Island), was a trooper in the police force. Apart from his postings around the state, he was also seconded to the Victorian Police, where he helped to track down Ned Kelly (that’s where the exhibition’s title comes from — Kelly called the black trackers on his trail ‘black devils’).

Out of this discovery I got interested in Sidney Nolan. Two of Nolan’s most famous preoccupations were [Fraser Island’s namesake] Eliza Fraser and Ned Kelly. Nolan didn’t see these figures as related, and yet in an eerie way I think they were: Wonamutta, whose country was re-named by Europeans after Eliza Fraser, was also the man who caught Ned Kelly. So through thinking about this personal history, and the random but weird connections it disclosed, I came to envision my exhibition as also responding to Nolan’s own practice. It was a art show about history, but also about the history of art.

Do you have any key references or inspirations?

Some abiding influences for me have been Albert Namatjira and Russell Drysdale. Namatjira looms especially large: because of his tragic life story, his amazing colours. The William Dargie portrait of him which hangs in the Queensland Art Gallery, and the Noel Counihan linocut, which shows Namatjira crucified, are some really important images for me.

Drysdale matters for me because of the colours of his burnt-out backgrounds and those extraordinary gaunt figures idling about in them. His representations of Aboriginal people are very respectful and moving.

Other artists who are key points of departure for me are the contemporary South African artist Marlene Dumas, and Bill Traylor who was a self-taught artist born into slavery.

What does art-making mean to you?

On an individual level, my art allows me to recover and remake the cultural heritages which were stolen from me. And I hope in this process that I remind people (even as I learn myself) about the forgotten pasts which shape everyday life in the present.

Mia is represented by Sunday Salon. Learn more about her practice here. Mia’s next exhibition will be at Milani Gallery from 4th – 25th September.

[mortifyingideal]

PLEASE TELL US ALL ABOUT CROWLEY DRINKING RESPECT AZIRAPHALE JUICE (both the WIP and just, like, as a theme in general)

oh HELLO this is one of my favourite ones

so @indieninja92 wrote a little fic that didn’t get much attention tbh, i think maybe a few people read it? i can never remember the title, i always just called it G is for Grindr like it’s a fuckin Sesame Street episode, ANYWAY

as the fic was ongoing more and more people in the comments section (which is a place i am known to skulk around) were asking about a Crowley POV of the events going on in the fic. indie never had plans to write any of it through the eyes of one completely legless demon, and said as much, and then i basically ran up to them (virtually) and screamed DIBS!!! in their face so hard that i popped three blood vessels

SO short answer: the WIP is, as it currently stands, some key and not-so-key moments from the horniest Sesame Street episode ever as retold by one Anthony J Crowley (esquire)

the SLIGHTLY LESS SHORT ANSWER is that Crowley does, in fact, drink his respect Aziraphale juice every day of his life. this was inspired by a conversation between me and indie where we were talking about Aziraphale’s motivations & emotions during the fic and how I believe (and so do they) that no matter what, Crowley and Aziraphale are friends first and foremost and that friendship is the MOST important. it means that they are both chugging their respect juice on the DAILY and any miscommunications that come about due to Effort Nonsense and People Putting Their Fingers Into Other People’s Mouths (And More) is not something that one would pitch a shitfit over and potentially wreck something that is so old it is both sturdy and precious at the same time. 

if you’re essentially two eternal leads in a Shakespearian romcom you can’t be getting het up about every little “you have some moral in this benedictus? ):<” along the way, and then that makes the effects of the juice all the more potent when one realises that the other really IS upset over something important and needs to be given space to breathe and move within that upset, and not immediately leap in and make demands. friendship, y’all. it’s fucking GOOD SHIT.

this is not strictly limited to Gen3 You Know Aziraphale Like THE BIBLE THE BOOK THAT YOU ARE IN or any of indie’s other fics but is a universal constant in the world of GO, but also does very specifically relate to G is for God Indie We Get It You Listened To Fall Out Boy As a Teen. 

Aziraphale in that fic has autonomy, and is Going Through Some Shit, and reacts to things based on Aforementioned Shit and GUESS WHAT. CROWLEY TAKES A STEP BACK, LEAVES WHEN HE IS ASKED, AND RESPECTS THAT BECAUSE

A) THEY ARE FRIENDS WHO LOVE EACH OTHER ANYWAY NO MATTER HOW THAT LOVE IS SHAPED AND THEY WILL FIGURE IT OUT

AND 

B) HE DRINKS HIS JUIIIIIIIICE.

the juice is delicious, and it tastes like piña colada. 

[jenner-benjamin]

Cecil Touchon

‘Fusion Series #3582′ by Cecil Touchon, 2015 - collage on paper.

Touchon is a well known artist in the asemic writing field though he is mostly known for his typographic abstract works. These are comprised of collaged letters whose geometric shapes are employed to create unique abstracted forms. This iteration of visual poetry reduces the lettering to an abstracted composition that, similarly to asemic writing, relieves them of their semantic content. Until I found Touchon’s work I had always read that asemic writing had its literary meaning stripped or obscured, but he explains how he sees his work has liberated language from its burden of being bearers of meaning; and as a result it liberates the reader from the task of deciphering and investigating the work. They are no longer bound to being literate and can enjoy the language solely as visually stimulating.

The typographic works by the very nature of collage seem to explore the dismantling and reassembling of the printed word whereas asemic writing by definition is typically characterised by an innate flow of calligraphic gestures. The common ground between the two seemingly opposing practices is the exploration of language. There is a tension between language as a tool for understanding, and an inquiry in to the composition of language in a more expressive way that does not abide by the conventions of what the written word means. It is this line of inquiry that interests me, though I strive to find a way a way that playfully explores the composition of the written word as well as using this language as a means to communicate to an intended audience.

‘Palimpsest Asemic Poem #2011.006′ by Cecil Touchon, 2011 - ink on paper.

‘Fusion Series #3638′ by Cecil Touchon, 2015 - collage on paper.

[kkotseo]

THE MUN

NAME: Inflicts confusion with its length and nature, and no one got the pronunciation right.

NICKNAME: Rinnie.

FACE CLAIM: Chibi version of Sakura Kinomoto from Cardcaptor Sakura.

PRONOUNS: She/her and they/them.

HEIGHT: 158 cm ( I suck at converting in feet and inches ).

BIRTHDAY: July 30th.

AESTHETIC: Black platform loafers, collar chains, colored contact lenses, lofi, matcha tea ( or just any tea ), round rimmed glasses, small birds chirping at the windowsill, sunlight coming through the cracks of the blinds on a peaceful morning.

LAST SONG YOU LISTENED TO: Saturday Night by G.O.D. ( ‘cause 1st generation idols are amazing & I need a bop to wake myself up after a 4-hours sleep ).

FAVORITE MUSE(S) YOU’VE WRITTEN: Juniel ( forever faithful to my first and still ongoing muse ) & her mutant counterpart ( despite very brief, hopefully making a return someday ).

THE MUSE

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO TAKE ON THIS MUSE: November 24th, 2012, was the day I dived into the world of roleplaying. At that time, I didn’t know much about this universe and who to choose as a muse. Juniel made her Korean debut on June 7th of the same year. I thought ❝ Oh, maybe I could portray her since she also just started in something as well. ❞ and I would follow her journey while including a touch of creativity and fiction. Her appearance, her aura, her character, her demeanor and her music. All those factors drew me to her. Fast-forward to the present time, 8 years passed by and she’s still around. My muse had gone through big events, some pleasant, others heartbreaking. She met people who impacted her in good and bad ways. All those elements shaped her to who she is now. My curiosity for her hasn’t faltered at all. What will happen next? What will she do next? From what I believe to be a one-dimensional muse due to my inexperience at first turned out to be a multi-layered sweetheart who I can’t stop writing about since it just comes naturally with her.

Oh, and I adore the thrill of roleplaying an underrated female faceclaim. It’s like I am on a mission to expose Juniel to the world.

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVOURITE ASPECTS OF YOUR CURRENT MUSE: There’s always something going on in her life somehow. The ups and downs are interesting to write about. Her days may be trivial with the daily grind of celebrities but the past events ( e.g. the long hiatuses in between comebacks while struggling to actually have her original tracks approved by her former company, the initial backlash during her debut as she was always compared to IU, the public’s most loved soloist, yet the popularity she earned from her classic title tracks, the unfortunate romantic relationships she had gone through ) caused turbulence in my initial perception of my muse. Definitely for the better.

I like how unexpected things can get when I’m writing with her. Sure, I could drop her and start over whenever it was rough, but that would ruin the fun of knowing all the potential scenarios I never thought of.

WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST INSPIRATION WHEN IT COMES TO WRITING: Oddly, the interactions themselves? Of course, books, dramas and movies are sources that can’t be turned down. However, I found myself inspired from hearing other rpers’ opinions when plotting, from imagining the possibilities in my muse’s reactions and replies to other muses. After all, roleplaying involves writing with others. The dynamic exchanges, both in character and out of character, are what makes writing exciting!

Oh! And there’s music! It sets the mood whenever I write something in particular. I specifically choose songs depending on their lyrics. I never write without music.

FAVORITE TYPES OF THREADS: Angst and fluff are what I feel the most comfortable writing about. If anything else, I like when threads allow me to delve deeper elements I wouldn’t have thought through for my muse, trivial or not. Whenever it implies a detailed explanation behind my muse’s actions and reactions, I love it.

BIGGEST STRUGGLE IN REGARDS TO YOUR CURRENT MUSE: Well, there’s always writer’s block combined with limited time allotted to the hobby since real life isn’t kind... but there’s also the awareness about English not being my first language. I do not have a vast and varied vocabulary as some rpers do. I’m aware my writing may appear simple, but I’ve learned to appreciate it. Though, the challenge remains in how to make it interesting to the other person. It is still complicated for me to write heavy descriptions rather than focus on the inner part of my muse. I also find it difficult at times to write with a distinctive flow. I always make sure there is one as I read my replies aloud before posting them. I have that tendency to delete an entire reply to start over. Just because it doesn’t sound right.

A recent struggle I noticed that can potentially take the first place is the lack of plots I desire to do. I apologize to all the rpers I approached so far with a blank mind ( my only compensation to it being my enthusiasm to find something fitting for everyone ). I guess my muse is dependent on others more than my own ideas. I’ve always gone with the flow!

Tagged by: Borrowed from @nakonvkv ( thank you by the way! ^-^ ) Tagging: Anyone who wants to do it!

[rivetgoth]

This is gonna be long, apologies in advance. Just wanted to type something up properly about all of my thoughts now that I'm home and decompressing 🖤

--

Last year, I took a late night flight back to LAX on the Monday after Cold Waves VII. My signed VIP poster was the most valuable possession I could possibly imagine, and I was scared of it getting crushed in my luggage, so I brought it as a carry on. I knew that if I listened to ohGr I would start crying, and I didn’t want to cry in the airport, so I waited, clutching my little rolled up poster that Ogre and Paul Barker and the whole ohGr crew had signed. Ogre had drawn a little heart and written “hugZ and much support Artistically.” I had picked a spot in the very back of the plane, because I thought it would be less crowded, and I was right. I had no one else around me, my row was empty aside from myself. I’ll never forget the feeling of looking out the window as the plane took off and I watched Chicago get smaller and smaller and turn to little specks of light in the night, clutching my poster like it was all I had to live for. I put on Sunnypsyop and cried myself to sleep.

There’s so much I want to say about Cold Waves and I don’t even know how to start, so I guess I can start at the beginning. Last year on September 20th I flew to Chicago for the first time in my life and met up with one of my best friends in the world, Trigger (Sylvan), to see Nivek Ogre, my biggest hero, and meet him for a second time (I was meeting both Trigger AND Ogre for a second time, actually). It was a life changing event for me. For starters, seeing Ogre is always life changing. The love and care and passion and kindness that he puts out into the world makes the whole planet a better place and lights up my life in a way that nothing else ever has. He’s the heart of the industrial scene for me, because it was through him that I got into this music and found this community. When I saw him, not only did he remember me from when we had seen each other before a year earlier, but he encouraged me not to give up on my art, telling me that not only was I talented but that he could see the work I put into what I did and could tell I was improving. He told me not to give up and gave me so many hugs and he drew me a puppy to get tattooed. Ogre was currently nursing a recently-broken jaw but he was in the cheeriest highest spirits, he was as warm and loving as ever and so excited about the tour, and he put on one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. His strength and resilience and passion for his art inspired me so much, and getting to see him alongside Trigger and even be able to tell Ogre that we met each other through our shared love of his work made the whole thing even more special. Over the course of the festival I also got to see the rest of the ohGr crew, Paul Barker, and Jared Louche, who were all incredibly sweet and fantastic. Many of them have been people I’ve had the honor to speak with either online or off various times since then and have served such a crucial place in my life as role models and figureheads of a community that means so much to me.

The whole weekend was incredible. Trigger and I made so many memories that I’ll cherish forever. I still laugh over so many little things. The show was amazing. I don’t know if I could ever envision a lineup cooler than Cocksure, Lead Into Gold, Chemlab, and ohGr back to back. So many heroes, so many legends. I was living in the middle of nowhere at the time and had missed a lot of concerts due to being unable to get to them. I was seeing people like Chris Connelly and Paul Barker for the very first time. I thought I would never see Chemlab, and yet there I was seeing them among so many incredible people who I had looked up to for so long. So many people who had changed my life and saved my life. But everyone was amazing, and I not only got to see other legendary incredible bands like Front Line Assembly (CYBERAKTIF!!), I got to discover new bands I relisten to all the damn time like ACTORS. I felt connected with everyone in the audience and I got to meet a ton of cool people who were so friendly and so accepting of me. Jim Marcus got on stage and gave a talk about how Cold Waves and the industrial community at large is like a family and I really believed it and felt it and knew it was true.

The craziest thing about Cold Waves VII, though, was the fact that I literally moved out of my parents’ house and to Los Angeles the very next day. When I landed in LAX in the middle of the night I didn’t go home – I met my parents at a little motel where they had brought all of my stuff, sitting in boxes in the back of their minivan. I had packed it all up before I left for Chicago. The next morning we moved everything into my dorm room and my parents left, and there I was living in Los Angeles, alone, away from my family for the first time in my life, at age nineteen. I had just been accepted to UCLA late that spring and classes started the Thursday after the festival. It was a huge change and a huge new beginning and I was so scared of what was to come. I was scared of being alone and I didn’t know if I’d be able to survive in LA. I didn’t know if I’d belong, if I’d be able to succeed, if I would be able to fit in anywhere. Cold Waves served as the opening to a whole new chapter of my life and I was able to leave the completely magical world of the Metro and fly to a brand new home and start my life with the knowledge that I had been surrounded just a day before by countless people who understood me and supported me and who felt the same love and passion as I did. The following month I got Ogre’s puppy tattooed, and I began going to local goth clubs and concerts and meeting up with various people and making friends nearby. It was a slow process that’s probably ongoing forever, but I feel like it all traces back to Cold Waves as a catalyst for a reminder that I would never be alone.

This year’s Cold Waves was a weekend I’ll hold onto for the rest of my life. With my venture into the Los Angeles goth scene and the world around it I met another one of my closest best friends, Angel, who’s now also my roommate. Funny enough I owe Ogre to our meeting as well, because our first conversation was about her going to see him. This time, she flew to Chicago with me to meet up with Trigger. Being able to add a third person to our little entourage was so fun and cool. I love both Angel and Trigger so so much and it was so cool to see our little group grow bigger and I felt like there was an instant ability to connect through shared jokes and shared passions and shared understandings. On the night that we got there, after a little bit of initial awkwardness just as we figured out what we were doing and settled into a workable dynamic between the three of us (and found food after a day of accidentally starving ourselves in the way one does when traveling), we ended up staying up until five in the morning doing “Chemlab karaoke” in our hotel room until we received a noise complaint (oops). Then we had to get up less than three hours later so we didn’t miss breakfast, and spent the whole first day of the festival running on about two and a half hours of sleep and weird tasting  hotel bananas. It was an amazing bonding experience and that night alone was some of the most fun I can ever remember having, just being able to hang out with two of my best friends and scream the lyrics to music we loved, so excited for what was to come. I was able to prove that I know EVERY lyric to “Jesus Christ Porno Star” before the noise complaint forced us to shut the hell up.

From here, I don’t even know how to start. How do I even begin to talk about the next four nights? For one, everything was perfect in a way that I didn’t know was possible. Absolutely everything went perfectly as planned. Everything worked out. It felt like we had entered a dimension where nothing bad could happen. Quickly discarding our failed attempt at continental breakfast, we got into a daily ritual of waking up, getting ready, loitering at the Starbucks by the Metro for a few hours, and then heading to the venue early enough that we were guaranteed a spot at the front of the theatre every single night (we didn’t do much Chicago sightseeing… we needed to sleep in with how late we were staying up each night, hehe). On the very first night Jared spotted us in line and came over to give us big hugs and say hi!! That was amazing, because we’d been looking forward to hugging Jared all year. And that was one of MANY to come!! We got to be front and center when Curse Mackey came on stage, who we’d been looking forward to since the release of his first solo album earlier this year. The album is completely fantastic as was his performance. Trigger and I had such a blast being able to scream along to every single song. When we yelled out “WE LOVE YOU CURSE MACKEY” he called back “I love you too!”, and he grabbed our hands so many times during the show. And then… fucking CHEMLAB!!!! Easily one of the best shows I’ve ever witnessed. It was so fucking perfect. The absolute chaos of the beach balls, Jared’s grand entrance, Curse’s return to the stage, the music, the paint, the feathers, Jared spitting water at us until we were covered in his spit, and then Adrian Halo, another friend I’ve made in LA who I love, was pulled onto the stage for the finale. And Jared gave Angel the painting he made on stage! I felt like I was going to cry just watching it all. It was so fun, so exciting, so thrilling. I never wanted it to end. After the show we got to meet up with Curse and Jared and they were both so unbelievably nice. It felt like talking to old friends. There was immediate acceptance of us as fans and as people. I can’t thank either of them enough for the kindness they showed. They made me feel like I belonged there and I mattered there and I was apart of something.

…And we WERE apart of something. We got to witness so much greatness. We got to cry in the front of the audience when Severed Heads ended their final song of their final set. We got to experience the raw, primal, intense excitement the moment Paul started blaring classic Ministry tracks from his Min-Dub Soundsystem. Acumen vs 16Volt were so fucking fun and cool and their backing footage at the end absolutely made me cry. Light Asylum was amazing and her return to the stage with Test Dept. (also totally mindblowing and so INDUSTRIAL) was so epic – As was her Leigh Bowery shirt, which was awesome (I love Leigh Bowery!). Every single band stood out and did something interesting, fun, engaging, creative, cool, etc. It felt like I was apart of something real and this community had carved a very real space for itself in the world of music and art. I got to meet in person people who I’ve known online for ages. People I’ve only ever chatted with through Instagram DMs and Facebook comments ran up to me and we immediately hugged and started talking and it was perfectly natural. We clicked immediately because we knew that we were all here for the same things. I got to make new friends while waiting in line or waiting for the show to start in the theatre. It felt like every single day I was making new friends or meeting up with old friends. I finally got to meet Jim Marcus in person and thank them for the times that they’ve been a pivotal role model for me in my life and give them the huge hug they deserve. I have so many memories that I’ll hang onto for the rest of my life.

I worry about being alone a lot in my life. Not necessarily physically alone – If anything, I love a lot of solitude and I’m not always very sociable. I’m definitely more introverted than extroverted typically. But I worry a lot about a more deep-seated loneliness, especially as an artist. I’ve always been drawn to artistic groups in history that functioned as, well, groups. Andy Warhol’s Factory and the New Romantic Blitz Kids have been interests of mine for a long time because I’m so fascinated in the idea of artists being able to form a community and be connected, even when there is a fallout or things don’t always go perfectly. I’ve struggled more than I care to admit with a sensation throughout my life of not belonging or fitting in with anyone anywhere. I’m good enough at putting on a friendly attitude and people tend to like me, it’s not even that I end up a social outcast. It’s internal, an inwards fear that no one will ever be able to understand me and people like me with the same passions as I don’t truly exist. But Cold Waves proves that they do. People “like me” in every type of way really do exist. It was completely amazing to be able to meet so many people, to be able to strike up conversations with just about anyone, to meet up with new friends and old friends and feel connected to so many human beings around me, all from different walks of life, from different parts of the country or even world, with different stories and hopes and dreams, but we all could be connected for that weekend to our shared love of industrial music and our shared love for Jamie Duffy and Chicago and everything that this subculture has built. The musicians themselves accepted us so quickly as apart of their world. We were more than just fans, there was a real exchange of energy and passion between creator and audience happening, a connection between everyone in the Metro.

On the last day of Cold Waves I wore a pig costume, partly because I love PIG and had been looking forward to seeing Raymond live since I saw him tour with Killing Joke the year before, but also partly just because I fucking adore pigs (the animal) and thought it would be fun. It was goofy and I almost didn’t do it because I was worried people would think I was stupid, but I love the idea of dressing up and wearing fun costumes and I wanted Raymond to see! It ended up being the perfect ending to the festival and it tied everything together so well. Everyone loved it. So many people complimented it and took pictures of me or with me. I’ve seen Instagram posts from strangers talking about me, mentioning the “devoted young fan in the pig nose in the front row.” I’ve seen Facebook posts that mention me. It sounds conceited, but it’s not that I care about popularity or attention, honestly – Most of these people will never even know my name. It was just so fun to be able to dress up in a fun way to support music that I love and represent something that means a lot to me and have such a hugely positive reaction, all these people who love it and accept and embrace it. Raymond reaching down to poke my pig nose during the show was the absolute highlight of the night, and one of the big highlights of Cold Waves altogether. I had a stranger come up to me after the show and say, “You know, you were a really important part of the PIG concert!” It totally made my night. I got to meet so many great people that night. I met up with Logan, who’s a total sweetheart and I’m SO glad we had the chance to connect in person after talking online, I also finally talked to another Angel who lives in LA who I had seen around and they were so so so sweet as well. I got to speak to Jim Marcus, as I said before (they’re my dad now), I got to say hi to and hug Paul Barker for the third time, I got to meet Raymond Watts for the first time and tell him about how much I love his work and hug him, I got to chat with all the people I had already met in line and in the front row the past few days for a final time. It felt so connected. I felt so connected to everyone. When Jim gave the talk on stage about our community and how much it matters and how we’re all there for each other, I really started to cry right there at the front of the audience. It’s so true in such a real and profound way that I’ve never felt anywhere else but in the industrial community. I was there hundreds, thousands of miles from my home in California, surrounded by people who were mostly more or less strangers, but I felt so connected to them and so accepted by them and I loved all of them so much and I felt like they loved me.

It’s so sad to leave Cold Waves and be back home. I love LA but there’s nothing like Cold Waves. There’s nothing like being in the Metro surrounded by everyone else like that. I can’t wait to go back. I feel so reinvigorated in my art and my projects, I want to create and I want to bring to life my own passions so that I can share them with others and give back to this community. I wish I had a way to properly thank everyone – All of the unbelievably talented musicians who are all so sweet and so humble and so amazing, all of the people in the audience who chatted with me and befriended me, all of the friends I made there and all of the friends I already had, the security guards, doormen, managers, everyone who helps keep the place together, Darkest Before Dawn, everyone who works tirelessly to put this event together each year. I don’t know where I’d be without it. Thank you so much for the most incredible time, I’m going to try to keep the spirit of Cold Waves alive in my art and creation even now as I settle back into my home. And I can’t wait to be back next year!

[a-man-adrift]

Writer Questionnaire

Internet hugs to the super talented @eluari​ for remembering that I exist, even though I’ve not been providing much evidence of the fact lately!

Short stories, novels, or poems?

I’ve written (or at least started!) all three, but I have a bad habit of not beginning a project unless I can see the path to the end, which usually limits me to shorts, or long-shorts/novellas at most.  Usually.  There was this one time when a whole novel plot sprang fully formed from my head… I’m still working on The Anti-Agathics War, I swear!

What genre do you prefer reading?

If I had to pick just one, I’d say SF, but I’m also fond of crime stories, thrillers, and Victorian novels.

What genre do you prefer writing?

Again, probably science fiction if I had to pick just the one, although examples abound of how you can tell almost any kind of story within SF… come to think of it, maybe that’s why I like it so much!

Are you a planner or a write-as-I-go kind of person?

A bit betwixt and between, really: I’ve not had a lot of luck with those writing exercises where you just start writing anything and try and bootstrap your way up to an idea, but on the other hand once I’ve had an idea I don’t need to do a lot of planning to run with it.  This does vary with length, though: I do have a skeleton for TAAW—one or two sentences per chapter, then sometimes divvying up chapters into scenes—whereas I can generally write a short story straight off the back of the idea for it.

What music do you listen to while writing?

Either something instrumental or something with lyrics I know really really well, so the words don’t distract me.  When I’m writing Mass Effect fanfic, as often as not I’ll put the game soundtrack on, since it’s one of the best things about Mass Effect, and has no distracting words!

Fave books/movies/tv shows?

Books: I love Lois McMaster Bujold’s Miles Vorkosigan novels: so much that I can’t pick just one, it has to be the whole series!  I’m also very fond of Wilkie Collins, with my favourites probably being Man and Wife, and the short story collection The Queen of Hearts, although his better-known novels, like The Woman in White or The Moonstone, are great too.  I also likes me some Isaac Asimov, particularly The Caves of Steel.

Movies: My absolute favourite is The Guard (2011).  Thanks to flickchart.com (which I recommend as an excellent waste of any superfluous time you may have hanging around!) I have a top 20, which you can check out at the link if you’re so inclined.

TV Shows: Breaking Bad absolutely deserves the hype, and I’ll always have a sentimental fondness for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, because it’s the Trek series I grew up with.

Any current WIPs?

The Anti-Agathics War is my main ongoing project.  I’m in the midst of the first of two chapters that form the climax of the piece, and I’m trying not to spook myself by angsting over whether I can live up to notes in my chapter plan like “Neela makes an awesome speech”!

I also have another Scene from the Life of Phil Shepard about two-thirds done, and generally I feel like I should keep adding to my Mass Effect fic output until I’ve gone from Phil’s parents meeting and deciding to move to Mindoir, all the way to Terri and Nezzy’s and li’l Ashley’s turn to save the galaxy!

If someone were to make a cartoon out of you, what would your standard outfit be?

Haha, probably chinos and an Oxford shirt.  I'd make up for it with wacky and memorable dialogue.  Hopefully.

Do you like incorporating people you actually know into your writing?

Really no. This was actually one of the things that killed a previous project: I tried joining the hallowed tradition of writing weird and wonderful events set in a university town and lab very much like the one I used to work at, but when I got to writing my viewpoint character meeting a bunch of grad students and post-docs very much like my real-life friends at the time, I found it incredibly skeevy.  Guess I’ll stick to aliens and space marines…

Are you kill-happy with characters?

Well, I did kill off Tali’Zorah, even though she’s one of my favourite canon characters, but no, on the whole I probably err the other way, on the side of keeping my character-babies happy!

Coffee or tea while writing?

No thanks!

Slow or fast writer?

Fast when I actually get down to it, which is at such infrequent intervals that, on average, glacially slow.

Where/who/what do you find inspiration from?

Well, obviously as a fanfic writer I’m inspired by my source material, but more generally my writing tends to owe a lot to whatever I’ve been reading most recently.  My saving grace, in that regard, if I have one, is that usually I know what source I’m riffing on when I do it, so I can turn it into a comment/reference/tribute to some source or other, rather than a plagiarism.

Most fave book cliche? Least fave book cliche?

OK, I’ll admit it: I like the typical Victorian/Edwardian male author’s conception of romance, where the hero loses his heart to the heroine on usually rather less than a paragraph’s-worth of acquaintance, and then suffers agonies of denial and self-doubt for chapter after chapter (in intervals of the plot moving itself along) until finally she admits that she quite likes him too!  I have to add a quote here, because it made me laugh:

'I say again that you are a foolish Robin,' said she, resting her cheek against my shoulder. 'You think your goose is a swan. But go on thinking it, and she will be as near a swan as she can manage, or failing that, a very faithful, affectionate goose.'

I don’t know about least fave, but one cliché I’ve been getting a bit impatient with lately is the one where the protagonist’s parent/mentor-figure dies at the most timely possible moment for the protag to step up and show that they can handle shizz on their own.  The man behind the curtain is so apparent in some of these that I wonder if the author just had really overbearing parents of their own, so that they can’t imagine any way a person could fully grow up without the olds getting killed off.

Fave scenes to write?

Fluffy home and family scenes always feel very self-indulgent, but they seem to go down well.  One of the perks of being a fanfic author, I guess!

Most productive time of day for writing?

This varies so much that I think the only honest answer is “any time when I don’t have something else I ought to be doing!”

Reason for writing?

Oh, some combination of “Liara is best waifu” and “BIOWARE U DUN GOOFED!”, probably…

I declare Omni-Tag!  If you see this and want to play, thou art subject to entagment!

[segadores-y-soldados]

Devil in the Details

So after Michael Chu confirmed that the details on the tv in the background of the Pharah panel in Reflections were not only deliberate but also meant to hint about her location and her father’s nationality -

This tinyass image -

On a page with this much other stuff -

It made me curious about any other potential details I previously overlooked or wrote off as “just a funny coincidence” and rather surprisingly, I might have kinda found something??

I mean, there’s a shitton here but what I originally wrote off as being “just another background piece” is the map -

...These are not Watchpoints.

These are the Watchpoints that still exist at the time of Recall - you can find this map on Watchpoint: Gibraltar (I did not write these locations, but this is the clearest, head-on image I could find.)

The image from the Uprising comic 

Are active missions or points of interest.

Locations that I can determine are:

Tokyo, Japan

Cairo, Egypt (based on the other screen discussing the “Cairo Incident”)

Numbani, Nigeria

(City unknown), Switzerland (?)

Paris, France

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Dorado, Mexico

Seattle, United States

More under the cut

I wanna go through these one by one.

First up:

Tokyo, Japan

This one is pretty straight-forward.

Uprising shows us that Genji has just recently joined Overwatch/Blackwatch and is currently in training and evaluation for his new cyborg body.  Genji’s hero profile states:

“[Overwatch] saw Genji as a potential asset in its ongoing operations to combat the Shimada clan. As Genji's injuries left him clinging to life, Overwatch offered to rebuild his body in exchange for his help. He was put through an extensive process of cyberization, which enhanced his natural speed and agility and augmented his superlative ninja skills. Transformed into a living weapon, Genji single-mindedly set about the task of dismantling his family's criminal empire.”

So we know that the Tokyo mission is very likely the on-going targeted mission against the Shimada clan, since Hanamura is meant to be based in the Tokyo area.

Cairo, Egypt + Paris, France (?)

I’ve seen hypotheses that the “Overwatch official murdered - Director Petras orders full investigation into Cairo incident” is about Gérard Lacroix’s death (also supported by the pretty obvious images of Widowmaker’s cameras in the little screen).  It’s not a bad hypothesis, but there are minor details that counter this:

“After several unsuccessful attempts to eliminate Gérard, Talon decided to change its focus to his wife, Amélie. Talon operatives kidnapped her and subjected her to an intense program of neural reconditioning. They broke her will, suppressed her personality, and reprogrammed her as a sleeper agent. She was eventually found by Overwatch agents, apparently none the worse for wear, and returned to her normal life. Two weeks later she killed Gérard in his sleep.”

This leads me to believe that the Paris, France mission is actually the one about Amélie and Gérard.

Especially given that Amélie appeared to have lived and worked there.

Interestingly, a different character references “Egypt” in the very same Uprising comic:

So there’s the possibility that the Cairo Mission is an event we haven’t seen yet.

Numbani, Nigeria 

So

We know this one now.

We know that Numbani faced consistent raids and assaults from both the Scourge Doomfist, and his “Successor,” Akande Ogundimu.  It appears that at the time of Uprising, Overwatch was already planning a mission to try and arrest Akande.

And this leads me into my next few points.

The reason I picked out Paris, Numbani, Rio de Janeiro, Dorado, and Seattle of all places is because the Soldier: 76 origins video actually has this map in it.  This video is over two years old, and was released just under a year before the actual game came out.  When I first saw the video, I went, “Well, Paris makes some sense because of Widowmaker’s story, Numbani and Dorado are maps in the game and have active places in the lore, and Rio de Janeiro is Lúcio’s home city.  But what the hell is up with Seattle?”

Seattle, United States

Jumping ahead a bit, as far as I can tell, Seattle is only listed as a place of interest twice in Overwatch canon material - once, in the Soldier: 76 video, and then nearly two, real world years later in the Uprising map.  There’s no Watchpoint there, no major hero is from there, and there’s seemingly nothing in the rest of the series to connect back to it.

A tantalizing hypothesis, however, comes with Michael Chu’s confirmation earlier this week:

Originally, fans were confused as to why Fareeha Amari, a woman with Egyptian origins, whose design clearly draws inspiration from the god Horus, had the Thunderbird and Raindancer skins, which appeared to be inspired by the Thunderbird iconography from the Native American/Canadian First Nations tribes of the Pacific Northwest.

While Seattle is definitely off from the fact that Reflections has a Canadian flag in the background of Fareeha’s dinner with her biological father, it is dead-on in the middle of the Pacific Northwest, and may be “close” to wherever Fareeha’s father is from, especially if he does have tribal affiliations.  This is not to say that he or Fareeha are Americans, but rather that the Pacific Northwest may be an area of “lore activity” that we haven’t seen explored yet, and may explain how and why an Egyptian sniper encountered “a public servant” and had a child with him in the years before the Crisis.

Dorado, Mexico

Unlike Seattle, this one also feel pretty straight-forward and obvious.  Dorado is a playable map in the game itself, and features a ton of lore, notably surrounding Sombra, the power company LumériCo, the company president and old war hero Portero, and the gang Los Muertos.  

And of course, it features into the lore of a certain old soldier.

References to both Sombra and Soldier: 76 can be found scattered across the two in-game maps, both Dorado and Castillo.  Also included on the maps are references to McCree and the Junkers, who pulled off a bank heist there roughly at the same time Sombra had her LumériCo email leaks.  McCree, meanwhile, had a, uh - “much needed” drink at the Calaveras bar at the time of Reflections, shortly after the email leaks and bank heist.

Interestingly, what the Uprising map seems to imply is that well before any of the “current” events happened in Dorado, Overwatch was already doing some sort of investigation into the city - but whether that was for LumériCo, Portero, or Los Muertos, we don’t know.  

However, it is telling that the only character who seems suspicious of LumériCo besides Sombra is Soldier: 76 - Jack Morrison himself.

“I wanna know what LumériCo is up to.”

Besides Sombra, Soldier: 76 is the only character to indicate that he’s actively investigating LumériCo, and based on the files found in the Dorado Defenders’ final spawn room

It appears that LumériCo is investigating him too.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

This one appears to be fairly straight-forward, but like Dorado, it’s the implications of what the Uprising map is hinting at that is the newest part to this story.

If you’re not aware, Rio de Janeiro is where Lúcio is from - he was born, raised, and lived in an unicorporated community (called a “favela”).  According to his background, Lúcio’s community in particular “was hit hard by the financial upheaval following the Omnic Crisis.”  Still, his community banded together and worked to rebuild their stability until, extremely recently - 

As in, after the Fall of Overwatch - 

Vishkar moved in.

In Symmetra’s comic, we learn that Vishkar attempts to get “dirt” on a rival, Brazilian company (Calado), but when their “infiltration agent” Satya fails to find anything “bad” about the CEO, Vishkar blows up the building.

Hypothetically, Overwatch “never knew about this,” because it occurs sometime in the five years since Overwatch disbanded.

But both the Uprising map and the Soldier: 76 map seem to imply that Overwatch was aware of something that was going on in Rio de Janeiro.

We know that Satya’s boss, Sanjay Korpal, was the one who gave the order to blow up Calado, and we also see him at the very end of the comic expressing a cold, orderly worldview about the nature of people in “what fits their station.”  It’s particularly horrifying when looking back at Lúcio’s profile, because once Vishkar moved in:

“Vishkar imposed controls on the residents in the name of building a more orderly society: enforcing curfews, cracking down on what the company perceived as lawless behavior, and exploiting the populace as a cheap labor force.”

There is an incredibly dark, awful undercurrent going on with Vishkar, with the implication of exploitative labor both in Rio de Janeiro and in Utopaea.  It isn’t surprising that even before the present, on-going events in Rio de Janeiro occurred, Overwatch may have been investigating the company the same way they might have been looking into LumériCo.

But, in light of Masquerade - 

In which we see someone who appears to be Sanjay Korpal in the Talon Council

(And yes, the lighting is harsh, but he appears to be wearing the same exact purple-and-white Utopaea uniform from the Symmetra comic)

An incredibly interesting, ridiculously tempting hypothesis is beginning to take shape.

Which brings me to the most interesting mission of all:

Switzerland

As a reminder, here’s the close-up map of the active missions/points of interest from Uprising again:

True, it’s such a small dot that it could be in France, it could be in Italy, but given the slightly awkward placement between the two, and the fact that it’s not clearly situated in one or the other

I’m gonna guess that it’s probably Switzerland.

Where exactly in Switzerland, I’m not sure.  Personally, I’ve always been of the mindset that the Overwatch “Swiss Base” is somewhere near Geneva, which is where the UN has a major headquarters, but Blizzard will pick or choose whatever it wants really.  What matters is that the dot for the mission appears to be somewhere in this region.

Now - this could mean a lot of things: Overwatch could be investigating a different point of interest in the region, they could be keeping an eye on the United Nations in Geneva, they could be keeping track of their own agents, etc, etc.

But let’s just cut to the most fascinating one, because that’s what we’re all here for:

As the UN investigation proceeded, Overwatch's Swiss headquarters was destroyed in an apparent accident. Among the casualties were Morrison and Reyes. The UN has steadfastly maintained that there was no foul play behind this event. However, an anonymous source has given me access to classified UN debriefings and other data that paint a different picture of Overwatch's final days.

These records indicate that a rebellion tore the group apart from within. On one side was Morrison, determined to hold together what remained of Overwatch. On the other side was Reyes, whose agenda remains unknown to this day. A battle raged between these men deep within Overwatch's base. At some point, their fighting triggered an explosion that destroyed the facility and sent the dreams of an entire generation up in flames.

Anyone who follows me knows that I don’t really believe Gabriel Reyes - now Reaper - did this, nor that I think Jack Morrison - now Soldier: 76 - did this.  All the other evidence points to another group, likely Talon, infiltrating Overwatch and destroying the base, possibly with the intention to frame and/or hurt both Commander Morrison and Commander Reyes.

“It was a conspiracy - Overwatch got hit from inside and out.” - Soldier: 76 Origin video

But as Overwatch's influence waned, rogue elements within Blackwatch sought to bring down the organization and turn it to their own ends. Wanting no part of the infighting, McCree set off alone and went underground. - McCree’s hero profile

It is believed that in her former life, Widowmaker was married to Gérard Lacroix, an Overwatch agent spearheading operations against the Talon terrorist organization. After several unsuccessful attempts to eliminate Gérard, Talon decided to change its focus to his wife, Amélie. Talon operatives kidnapped her and subjected her to an intense program of neural reconditioning. - Widowmaker’s hero profile

Though to the outside world his motives are inscrutable, there are those who claim that he is a former Overwatch agent, determined to shed light on the conspiracy that brought down the organization. [...]  Unrelenting in his search to find those responsible for Overwatch's fall, Soldier: 76 will stop at nothing to bring them to justice. - Soldier: 76′s hero profile

What the Uprising map appears to imply is that Overwatch was not only aware of the conspiracy within their ranks - 

But was actively investigating it.

In theory, this could have been extremely difficult, because both Overwatch and its covert ops/intelligence division Blackwatch were getting hit with penalties and suspensions left and right, even at the time of Uprising.  The Uprising comic shows that the UN was already in the process of “trying to investigate” the peacekeeping agency, but it also shows us that - despite the efforts of people “both inside and out” to keep the organization down, it continued to function.  It was still training new agents -

Conducting arrests

Potentially investigating corruption and human rights abuses

And with Masquerade now giving us a potentially new angle to see Reaper/Gabriel Reyes’ actions:

http://segadores-y-soldados.tumblr.com/post/163200042035/death-becomes-you

We may be looking at a very tiny, very small detail that points to the fact that Overwatch was potentially aware of its very own impending downfall - 

And was actively trying to stop the conspiracy creating it...

Or perhaps...

Infiltrate it.

I’ve been saying for awhile that Reaper’s actions with regards to certain missions are highly suspicious and - to be perfectly honest - pretty damn embarrassing for a man who has done covert operations for like, 30 years.

Unless, of course

That’s exactly what Reaper wants Talon to think.

We are told Reaper “is hunting former Overwatch agents and systematically eliminating them,” but as a reminder - Reaper has failed to kill or even seriously injure any ex-Overwatch agent in any of his canon material appearances.  Soldier: 76, Ana Amari, Winston, and Tracer are all still alive and, honestly, perfectly healthy at the end of their different encounters - hell, Reaper almost goes out of his way to actively piss Winston off (twice) and “throw” the missions.  He claims to have killed Overwatch agents in Masquerade, but as a general reminder, never believe in those “off-screen deaths,” kids.

It’s an easy plot device to bring “old soldiers” back from the dead.

And remember

Blizzard is actively trying to mislead you about certain characters:

“One of the things that we really like doing with Overwatch is playing with perspective.  We utilize perspective when we tell stories about what characters are thinking, what their goals are - and we have a lot of unreliable narrators.” - Michael Chu, GDC 2017

Blizzard loves putting references into the game and comics:

“I tend to like hiding some pretty obscure references in the game, and I get equal parts enjoyment when people don’t discover them as when they do,” [Chu] said.

Like these: http://segadores-y-soldados.tumblr.com/post/157378862270/reaper-and-soldier-american-cultural-references

If you pay close attention to the ridiculous and almost overwhelming amount of references within the game, it’s not at all surprising that some of that finally flipped over into canon source material.

Reaper and Soldier: 76 in particular are littered with pop culture and literary references - everything from Commando, to Michael Jackson, to, yes, Edgar Allen Poe.  “Red Death” Reaper is not just his second Poe reference, but his third American literature reference (the Headless Horseman being the second).

I know some people think that these kinds of essays are “reading too deep” into the references, but now that Michael Chu has outright confirmed that stuff as small as this

Can be important to a character’s background

You can bet I’m taking this moment to indulge in some bigger ideas.

Because remember, y’all:

“No one left behind.” - Reaper

The devil

“You’re the boss.” - Soldier: 76

Is in

Soldier: 76: Well. You sure take to this bad guy thing easily, don't ya? Reaper: And you sure know how to play boy scout.

The details.