#is this out of character? probably

[crobones]

what if there was a fic from louis' perspective about pining over Daniel

and Louis realizing he cared for young and interesting Daniel just as much as he now "cares for" old man Daniel. Grampire Daniel is the best of both worlds but it's pining because he's convinced Daniel takes to vampirism so well because can experience independence again and be a free spirit, and really Louis almost convinces himself that he's just jealous of Daniel's second chance at reconnecting with his family. Because Daniel could talk with his exes or his daughters as a result of vampirism going public and the Daniel he knows could have been a great husband and father if the two of them had just never met and Daniel didn't get his brain broken by several days of constant mind manipulation and trauma. Louis knows he's just trying to make excuses for having been obsessed with a mortal, passing it off as "he's interesting" and some part of Louis is convinced that he doesn't know how to be independent and he should learn from Daniel.

Louis distracts himself by immersing himself fully into vampire society and making allies and killing those that try to kill him first and really he doesn't have to take on the responsibility of fending off vampires going after Daniel because Armand is also there in the shadows but Louis almost feels responsible for what's happening to Daniel. for both having been turned out of spite, and becoming a target, and really Louis just cares about Daniel's safety! that's all!

it's no matter that his thoughts turn to Daniel constantly, or to Daniel's happiness, or his old man hands, or the lovely curls that are even more lovely now that they're silver and grey, or his extremely attractive carefree confidence, or his colour shifting eyes that were always so expressive but now even more so, or his tongue that's always cracking wise but now is always licking at or playing with his fangs mindlessly like he doesn't know how sexy it is.

he also realizes that he's better at maintaining a telepathic conversation during his occasional hook-up with Lestat because either Lestat never realizes it now, or he simply ignores it and enjoys what Louis gives him, willfully ignorant to the lengthy conversations Louis has had with Daniel in flagrant delicto when Daniel just calls him out of the blue sometimes (curious that Daniel's timing has caused this happen more than a few times.) Daniel definitely doesn't know, because that would be embarrassing and how could he explain it away? how can Louis explain that he's orgasmed with the sound of Daniel's rough laughter filling his mind at some joke that probably wasn't even that funny, but don't worry Louis is sure there's no connection there.

Louis' fine. He's fine.

When Daniel finds out all that Louis is doing by killing other vampires that set out to hurt his boy, of course Louis will play it off as feeling responsible for it all - for every bad thing that has happened to Daniel but Daniel just laughs at him and Louis' a bit hurt but Daniel explains that they'll never know if '73 really broke his brain because it's in the past and they're here now and maybe Louis should get over himself, just a little bit. Daniel made his own decisions, ruined his own marriages, was estranged from his own daughters for nearly a decade because of his own fuck ups. Louis shouldn't blame himself for everything, because Daniel doesn't blame Louis at all. Daniel appreciates the apology, but wishes Louis didn't make himself the sin-barer. Daniel says he wouldn't be his friend if he blamed Louis for any of it.

Louis' relief is followed closely by a hollow ache in his chest and really all he's ever wanted was a friend, so why did it hurt when Daniel said it? Vampires become obsessive over everything, surely he's just being protective of his only friend. The friend that cares about what Louis wants and not just what he thinks he needs, or what he could take from Louis. Daniel is a fantastic friend. Friend. Fuck.

[cronchy-baguette]

double posting this comic bc tbh it deserves its own post.... thinking about how elphie was definitely crying after she runs off to hide somewhere following popular... what do the two of them think about afterwards....

[tossawary]

This is petty fandom salt, BUT... I've been chewing on this phenomenon that I've been calling "Fandom's Darling". It is related to things like "Author's Darling" and "Mary Sue / Gary Stu" and "Protagonist Halo" and all that jazz, where one character gains a peculiar narrative weight in a story.

"Author's Darling" is when a writer has a favorite character, and the world and all other characters sort of get... warped to put the Darling in the spotlight. It's most noticeable in TV shows with multiple writers, when a character you personally like suddenly has their previous characterization destroyed to make another character look good somehow. Every other character might become weirdly incompetent. The Darling's feelings are treated as The Most Important Feelings in any given situation. The logic of the fictional world seems broken past suspension of disbelief in order to validate this one character's beliefs or skillset or some other fantasy. And so on.

"Fandom's Darling" is what I've been calling the pattern where a fandom essentially crowns a New Protagonist for their fanfiction stories (it's often a side character rather than the original protagonist, but it can also happen to protagonists). This character becomes the self-insert for all sorts of indulgent fantasies, gaining special powers or backstories, and/or becoming the focus of extreme whump, and/or hooking up with all the various hotties, starring in all sorts of tropey AUs, and so on. They're not always an obvious Mary Sue version of themselves, but the character's original personality and interpersonal relationships tend to get warped or dropped completely, and other characters tend to become a little flat around them. I call it "Fandom's Darling" because it's not just one self-indulgent fantasy fic (you do you! Have fun!) with characterization choices that I don't vibe with (I have neither the time nor the desire nor the authority to police anything, I am just venting), but rather a prolific mini-fandom of sorts revolving around this empty doll / fanon version of the chosen vessel character, so it becomes a little unavoidable.

I am salty about this (mildly frustrated) (imagine a soft sigh of disappointment before I just go do something else) because you are FUCKED if you actually liked the canonical version of this character and their interpersonal relationships. It's almost worse than liking an obscure character that no one cares about. There's about a thousand fics starring your fave, but maybe only about a dozen of them are actually rooted in any kind of recognisable canon.

[egophiliac]

still ruminating over Lost In the Book With Spooky Skeletons Part 1, so here's a selection of some of my favorite little bits! (...some more loosely paraphrased than others) (I just feel like Idia has no room to criticize in general, okay)

anyway, I'm sure we're just going to have a fun time celebrating Halloween and nothing bad is going to happen whatsoever! :)

[chloesimaginationthings]

Abby went into the pit and made a FNAF friend..

[puppppppppy]

who is your favorite AA character? 👁️👁️

ziska… I hope capcom brings her back someday

[whosbian]

[technically-human]

Bisexual crisis Crystal edition

[akanemnon]

That's two jailbreaks in one day!

FIRST - PREVIOUS - NEXT

MASTERPOST (for the full series / FAQ / reference sheets)

[zorangezest]

thanks for listening

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Look what we've become.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[gale-force-storm]

Thinking about the fact that, to pull Gale from the stone and get him in the game at all, you have to decide to try to touch an extremely dangerous looking swirling mass of unstable magic. Something that is, objectively, a terrible idea

Like, the options it gives you are to either touch the sigil or leave, and if you leave you just... don't get Gale in the party

You have to take the risk. You have to let your curiosity override your common sense. You have to look at this unstable, possibly dangerous malfunctioning magic sigil and go "...Ok, but what if I poke it?"

In short, to get Gale in your party, you have to do exactly what he would in that situation, and indulge in a moment of reckless curiosity. And I just think that's delightful

[dootznbootz]

Sorry, not sorry but I see this too often and it bothers me :)

Before people get mad: Notice how I put “Me and Penelope fans” there? I know there's others. this ain't about you <3

edit: This is about how people in the fandom prioritize Odysseus and Telemachus (and even Diomedes, who is not in the Odyssey) despite the Odyssey also being HER story as well. I've seen many fics about Odysseus and Telemachus in their youth, and never really seen that for Penelope.

[egophiliac]

WAIT when did he get FANGS

[chloesimaginationthings]

Gregory has it best out of the new FNAF protagonists..

[apostaterevolutionary]

Okay can I be a bitter Anders fan for like. Just 2 minutes here lmao

Cause bioware released some game stats for veilguard and apparently 72% of players redeemed Solas which is like. Okay yeah the game kinda pushes you towards that. But when I think of all the shit I used to have to put up with just for enjoying Anders like at all and…

(This is not me being anti-Solas, I do not care if you love or hate him, but I am gonna say what he’s done is like. Objectively worse than literally every other companion so lmao. And that’s fine! You can still enjoy him! I’m not saying you can’t and it’s important to me that people understand that! I’m just saying he did in fact do objectively morally worse things in game than Anders did and I don’t think that’s really debatable. And I can’t really make my point here without saying that but I do want to make it clear this is not some moral condemnation of Solas enjoyers cause it’s not)

Getting anon hate on the regular, being told “oh you’re allowed to like Anders as long as you regularly talk about how much he sucks”, people gleefully describing how much fun they have killing him ON your posts about the fact that you like him, the devs making jokes about shitty fates for him when fans asked innocent questions about him, the absolute audacity of his writer to say half the shit she did in interviews (about bisexuality and mental illness, most critically), and then being beaten over the head again in inquisition about how Anders is the worst character to ever exist and there’s no redemption for terrorists who lie to you one time in the entire game and he deserves death or worse and that’s it

And now… 72% of people are down to redeem the guy who lies to you for 2 games straight and who did a lot of questionable things that includes creating the fucking blight and. Like. I guess I’m glad that Solas fans can live in a world where they aren’t constantly harassed and can give their ship like. A pretty damn good ending all things considered. And that the devs love Solas and actually give the option for that happy ending and have characters go to bat for Solas throughout the game and the most annoying thing they have to see are people making scrambled egg memes. I would not wish anyone to have to deal with the shit Anders fans had to put up with back then cause it sucked. It really sucked. And I’m glad it’s not being repeated with a different character, if nothing else

But like. Man there really is a difference when the writers actually like the character who does the thing, huh