#it basically just turned into a whole ship history

[siobhanhazel]

Shivvy's favs of HP Secret Santa Rare Pairs

In December I participated in HP Secret Santa Rare Pairs 2024! 

I read a lot (but not all) of the fics, and I would like to highlight my favourites 💕

As of Jan 8th, I have read about 103 fics out of the approx 129 of the creative writing category works! The remaining fics I either skimmed and decided they weren’t my cuppa or I still have them on my to-read list.

Again, this is completely just subjective and to my own particular tastes (which lean very heavily towards queer content). All of the writing and other creations were amazing contributions to different corners of the fandom and I know we all did our best to create amazing gifts for our giftees! Reminder: I don’t wish to receive any comments that fall out of the range of the three basic fandom courtesies: YKINMKBYKIO - Your Kink Is Not My Kink, But Your Kink Is Ok  || SALS Ship And Let Ship  || DL;DR - Don’t Like; Don’t Read

Yah so - if you don’t like, don’t read, n' don’t reply anything negative at me. Thank you! 💕 * But if you notice some info or link errors please let me know (tired eyes). 💛  = my brief squee/comments

Gifts I Received

Thank you so much to my gift writers! I included so many ship requests and was so happy to see I got Severus twice kekeke. 🎁 Fragile Bonds by @picklesonjupiter / picklesonsaturday 💕 Sirius/Severus  || T || 309 words Sirius seeks healing from Snape, but their complicated history and growing feelings make the process more challenging. 💛 I love Severus’ hands… I love Severus being adept at using his hands… I love Severus being adept at using his hands on another man…! On Sirius! LOVE. 🎁 No Need to Hide Under These Friday Night Lights by @maraudersaffair / maraudersaffair 💕 James/Severus   || E || 5,096 words James Potter is the most popular boy in school. He's even the star quarterback on the football team. And for some strange reason, he won't stop staring at Severus Snape. 💛 I swooned when I realised I’d get non-magical High School AU Princechaser!! It is so sweet and so smutty, I love it!

Fics I Went Feral For (reverse alphabetical by pairing)

🎁 the gift that keeps on giving by @the-invisibility-bloke / the_invisibility_bloke 💕 Teddy/Draco/Harry || E || 12,993 words There’s only one thing Teddy wants for Christmas: to lose his virginity. 💛 I went feral for this fic and am now obsessed with Tedrarry - the wit, the pacing, the pining, the smut…! All the comments for this are rave reviews, please read it and other fics by the author! (they write a lot of Sirry and other pairs too)

🎁 Hold onto this lullaby (even when the music's gone) by @knotsnuffles / objectlesson 💕 Sirius/Harry || E || 8,345 words The truth is, Harry doesn’t just want Sirius buying him fine robes and dressing him in them—in his heart of hearts, he wants Sirius to take him out of these robes, too. 💛 Another unstoppably fantastic Sirry fic by objectlesson! Mind the tags and if it’s your jam, curl up for fluff/smut and Sirius taking care of Harry.

🎁 speeding through red lights (into paradise) by @the-invisibility-bloke / the_invisibility_bloke 💕 Sirius/Harry || E || 9,975 words Just before fifth year, true to form, Harry does something very brave and very foolish. 💛 This turns the dial for ‘Harry Pining for Sirius’ up to max Brilliant prose by the author, highly recommend if the tags make it seem like your thing.

🎁 Pink Aster - Days Gone By by @trueliarose / Trueliarose 💕 Severus/Charlie || E || 45,664 words Fire melts ice, or so they say. Severus just hadn't thought that that applied to the ice in one's soul as well. Or, When Charlie Weasley came to Hogwarts to accompany the dragons for the triwizard turnament, he met Severus Snape. But can a short affair turn into a lovestory? 💛 This long fic has my whole heart! Severus is written wonderfully, the sex is spot on, and the atmosphere and Charlie’s care is just chef’s kiss! It spans canon and my heart aches along with Severus and Charlie as they fall in love amidst the war.

🎁 Rematch by p0intless_p0et 💕 Pansy/Ginny || T || 2,239 words In a cold, dark Hogwarts, ruled by fear and suspicion, Pansy Parkinson and Ginny Weasley find an unlikely spark on a makeshift Quidditch Field, and, much to everyone's amusement, only one of them can play Quidditch. 💛 The characterisation is just perfect, the atmosphere of Book 7 Hogwarts is stunning, and I thoroughly enjoyed this and reread it already, perfect Ginsy rivalry.  

🎁 Teacups & Tankards by @schmem14 / Schmem_14 💕 Madam Puddifoot/Madam Rosmerta || M || 9,589 words Bea and Ros are best friends who learn love and trust as they suffer loss and heartbreak during the Second Wizarding War. 💛 AAAH ITS SO SWEET AND EMOTIONAL and they are perfect for each other, please, come meet these sweet ladies with their slow romance kicking off during the hardships of war. It’s infused with so much heart and sexiness, I cannot recommend this enough! 

🎁 Rotten Roots by p0intless_p0et 💕 Neville/Draco || G || 2,335 words Draco Malfoy has everything he needs to complete Snape's potions work, everything but the ingredients. Neville is the Herbology professor at Hogwarts, he'll give Draco what he needs, at a price. 💛 Draco laced with guilt, and Neville's gentle hand guiding him close, showing Draco he knows him, and can be there for him. It’s suuuch a brilliant set up for a Dreville, it makes your heart ache for Draco, and Neville is so solid and steady and supportive!

🎁 Carry A Piece Of Me by @skywatcherrose / sky_watcher_rose 💕 Narcissa/Minerva || M || 3,471 words In the aftermath of a lost war, Narcissa and Minerva are just doing their best to survive - and perhaps take a little pleasure along the way. 💛 These two women, loving each other and holding strong as part of the feeble underground resistance… I love the tenderness of their intimacy during the darkness of war. Amazing portrait of these women!

🎁 A Tale of Two Tonks Women by @midnightstargazer / MidnightStargazer 💕 Andromeda & Nymphadora || T || 3,632 words Throughout her life, Tonks defies her mother’s expectations. Andromeda couldn't be prouder of her. 💛 I felt like I never understood Andromeda until this character study piece which is all about Tonks and her mother’s relationship. Very worth the read, thought provoking!

Fics I Want to Highlight  (reverse alphabetical by pairing)

🎁 Brightest Witch and Brightest Star by @jinrosemoon / JinRoseMoon 💕 Sirius/Hermione || M || 511 words

🎁 The Tabby Teapot by @celestemagnoliathewriter / CelesteMagnolia 💕 Seamus/Dean & Minerva/Poppy || T || 8,768 words  

🎁 Good Together by @anaxandria-writes / Anaxandria 💕 Neville/Theo || T || 800 words  

🎁 The Heat of the Moment by @schmem14 / Schmem_14 💕 Marcus/Percy || E ||  8,638 words  

🎁 Live for Today by  @schmem14 / Schmem_14 💕 Marcus/Oliver || M || 2,273 

🎁 Ron Weasley: GILF Hunter by @alyceofthetogas / AlyceoftheTogas 💕 Madam Puddifoot/Ron || E || 2,456 words

🎁 Look What We Found by @daydreamingfoxglove / DayDreamingFoxglove 💕 Luna/Pansy || T || 3,048 words  

🎁 Just Warming Up by briarandbone 💕 Hermione/Pansy || M ||  2,102 words

🎁 Prodigal Daughters by @chemicalwildflowers / QueenOfStormySkies 💕 Hermione/Andromeda || T || 3,952 words

🎁 In the Bleak Midwinter by @apricitydays-lazynights / Apricitydays 💕 Cho/Ginny || G || 2,340 words

🎁 The Beginning of the End by @mymindisverycomplicated / mymindisverycomplicated 💕 Cho/Dudley || T ||  27,265 words  

🎁 Frostbitten by @mrsprobie / mrsprobie 💕 Astoria/Luna || G || 346 words

🎁 Family Is What You Make It by sky_watcher_rose 💕 Arabella/Minerva || T || 5,366 words

🎁 Gurbaith-Feuer by @mitsuki91 / MitsukiSirya 💕 Albus/Tom || E ||  15,395 words

Gifts I Made

🎁 Copper and Blond Catharsis by SiobhanHazel 💕 Draco/Ron || E || 16,642 words Post-war, mild angst, porn with plot, fluff and smut etc 💛 For suniwrites - I had a great time writing something a lil dark and sweet! 

🎁 [Art] Hug Him Back by SiobhanHazel 💕 Sirius/Severus || G || 💛 For Julesss - It was so fun to exercise my drawing skills with a cute Snack pic!  

A Few Fav Non-Fic Entries

There were sooo many amazing art and other crafts etc! I didn't have a serious chance to look through them all again, but the ones that came to my mind as amazing are:

🎁 [game] What's that ship? by @lumosatnight / lumosatnight 🎁 [Art] So… Thank You by @sillylittlebeans / sillybeans 💕Harry/Bill || G ||  🎁[Sculpture ] Lazy Sunday by @elisedonut / elisedonut 💕Percy/Oliver || G || 🎁[Comic] Kiss Me if You Can by sillybeans 💕Cedric/Harry || G ||  🎁[Craft] Meet Me Outside by @sugareey-makes-stuff / sugareey 💕Marcus/Oliver || G || 

There were so many other amazing things (esp art!) but alas I have run out of steam! That’s all, it was an amazing batch of fics, I was so happy to participate and read! Kudos to everyone!

[milkywayes]

okay so happy pride month or whatever, no one asked but here’s my garrus vakarian dating history headcanon:

he has had 5 casual hookups pre-normandy, which isn’t a big number compared to his peers, and you’d think it’s because he’s an obsessive little freak who’s bad at being a turian, which evens out his good looks and swagger (and for some it does - cue some very frustrated crushes being forcibly stamped out because ‘really? that guy? he yelled at our superior last week in full view of the entire canteen’) but really he just didn’t notice half the advances made at him and the other half he turned down because he was busy thinking about important stuff (like gun mods, or cases, or math) and after careful consideration and weighing the pros and cons decided his time was better spent elsewhere. two of the 5 were with men, the other three with women, all turians. no repeats. he has had zero relationships pre-shepard if you don’t count the homoerotically-charged friendship he had as a teenager, one year before and one year into boot camp, before their very different abilities got them postings on opposing ends of the galaxy (read: elite sniper units on stealth patrol ships vs guy that assists the guy that fixes the lights in a backwater colony). he thinks no one knew about this, but his whole family did know and just tactfully didn’t bring it up. during the archangel years he has 1 hookup mostly because everyone tells him he’s so high-strung and needs to get laid more than he needs oxygen, but he bows out early on because his depression isn’t really conductive to the proceedings (read: she came but he didn’t.) this somehow ends up adding to the archangel urban myth, a true hero of the people asking for nothing in return, wink nudge, which makes him the butt of his team’s jokes quite literally until they all die bloody. he has never been in love until shepard, is initially unable to even categorize the feeling, and unfortunately for him, dealing with uncertainties and gray stuff and undefined parameters are about the only thing he’s actually bad at (besides the whole model turian stuff, if you count that as a skill). so basically his skill tree gets inverted as soon as he catches feelings. previous hookups would have described him as a gallantly attentive but emotionally unavailable, doesn’t save your omni-tool address but remembers your name kind of guy, which he mentions once to shepard. doing so is a faux-pas, though she doesn’t point this out and instead laughs uproariously because just that day he dented his newly-polished armor in his attempt to hold the elevator for her

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[avelera]

A few random thoughts about the comic issue of "Men of Good Fortune" in The Sandman and how they pertain to Dreamling as a ship based on the show.

I get the sense when reading MoGF that it's a... shall we say, "young" story? It's the sort of story that has its seeds in your high school creative writing class. You're learning about English history and you're also writing short stories and you think, "Wouldn't it be cool if two guys met every 100 years to talk about these events I'm learning about and it's the same guys because they're immortal?"

I say this in part because I wrote a similar story in high school without having read MoGF, but also because it's a very simple story with no actual plot arc, nothing actually changes by the end in the original comic. The addition of Dream "missing" the meeting adds a lot of weight and consequence that isn't there in the comic. The closest it gets is, "Dream says he's not going to come to the next 1989 meeting but then a bunch of stuff happens off screen and he shows up anyway, thus confirming they are indeed friends." That is barely a plot beat of any kind, nothing really changes, it just clarifies that they are friends, which we could have suspected the whole time.

Anyway, on that note, I've got a deep-seated suspicion that in the very earliest drafts of this story, Dream was Death. Because it makes sense. Death spares a commoner on the condition that he report back every century to tell about how his life is going. Also, Death is certain that this mortal will want to die at some point because of all the horrible things he's living through, but in the end he doesn't and they become friends.

Again, this is a very simple story, basically a fable. Then this story is lifted into a new setting, the Sandman universe, and the antagonist of Death is turned into Dream but Death is still there, because Death as a figure makes much more sense than Dream as the basis for this wager.

I've commented many times before that Hob has less than nothing to go on as far as guessing Dream's identity but that one very natural conclusion he could come to is that Dream is Death because Death is much easier and thematically consistent with what happens in the story than Dream. Dream even remarks in the show (paraphrased) that, "[He] is far more terrible than Death," which objectively makes very little sense other than in their personal mannerisms.

But Dream's curiosity as to Hob's will to live isn't all that consistent with his function as Lord of Dreams, can you really tell me that the Lord of Dreams can't conceive of a mortal that would want to live forever, who wouldn't dream of living forever? IMO this is one more piece of evidence that the story was lifted from an earlier draft where there is no Dream and Death, there is only Death and Hob, with Death left in as sort of a homage to the original premise and to explain why Dream would get involved at all in such a wager.

It also kind of explains why the implications of this centuries-long friendship get largely ignored until quite late in the Sandman comics. Dream would be Hob's only constant, at least that he can speak to and isn't like the Sun and the Moon or something, and yet our only nod to this is very very late in the comics.

Again, I think this is because in a fable about Death and A Normal Guy meeting over and over as a commentary on English history, it makes perfect sense that you wouldn't really explore the interpersonal implications of how Hob feels about this guy, if Hob cares about this guy, because it's Death, clearly this is just a fable.

But once it's not Death, once it's someone else, once Dream's interactions with this guy actually don't align with his function, actually rather glaringly doesn't align with his function such that his relationship with Hob actually becomes Dream's biggest singular point of individuality, the biggest piece of proof that he is an individual person and not just his function because watching this guy live has nothing to do with his function because he's not Death, then we also begin to wonder how important are these guys to one another, as individuals, because it's not a simple, streamlined fable anymore about Death and Just A Guy meeting.

Basically, I think that as is often the case, the inconsistencies are what give some of Gaiman's juvenilia works the charm that they have. They raise more questions than they answer, because they're not rigorously plotted and the implications of certain story decisions aren't explored, for example even how magic like immortality works in this world doesn't really make consistent sense (ex. Orpheus and Hob have very different immortalities within the same story despite both being gifted by Death, one can't choose to die whenever he wants and there's no explanation as to why this is other than The Story Demands It, which is rather clumsy but does lend to a sense of myth).

It's not until much later in the author's career in the comic and (retconned with) the show that the narratives begins to inquire into things like, "What do these two individuals mean to each other as people. Does Hob mourn Dream, or think of him when he's not there? Does the singularity of Hob in Dream's life matter to him, or give him pause?" all questions that would be absurd in a simplistic fable about Death and Just A Dude but once lifted from that original context, create fascinating inconsistencies that begin to matter and become fodder for deeper explorations as seen in fanfiction and shipping these two characters.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Ways to Generate an Idea

Borrow a Plot 

Write a summary of 3 books or movies or stories you love.

Include important characters, major plot turns, and setting.

Here’s an example: 

A teenage girl lives in a dystopian world where the USA has been divided into 13 Districts, and every year children are chosen from each district to fight to the death. The teenage girl volunteers to fight in place of her sister. She tries to survive while also protesting against the evil Capital and (maybe) falling in love. (Hunger Games)

Then, choose one of the summaries and start changing around different elements - characters, setting, plot turns, adjectives, verbs, etc.

See where those changes take you, and keep writing when you get inspired. Here’s an example:

A teenage girl lives in a future where the oceans have risen and everyone lives on small islands. The water is controlled by pirates who demand a sacrifice each year to keep the island safe. The girl is chosen, but in a storm, she’s rescued by a different kind of pirate ship - one made up of former would-be sacrifices who act as pirates against the pirates. And…

Borrow a Character 

Invent a history or future for someone.

Examples: Maybe it’s a friend you lost touch with after college, a teacher you had, a family member you’ve heard stories about, or just someone you’ve seen in photos or on the bus. A novel starring your great-grandmother, inspired by pictures you’ve seen of her (even if you'd never really heard anything about her). 

Questions to consider: Who is the person that intrigues you? What was their childhood like? What did they dream of? What was their greatest desire? What obstacles did they face? What was their greatest triumph?

Finally (since most novels aren’t someone’s entire life story), you have to find the story:

What part of that imagined life has the most drama, the most ups and downs? A moment of adventure or possibility or danger, when things changed? Remember, you’re INVENTING this person, so feel free to let your imagination run free. 

News You Can Use

Pick an event from the news.

Imagine it from the perspective of different people involved with it.

Example: A story about a river flooding might include the single mother driving her two kids on a camping trip, the park ranger called in to help, the farmer who lives down the road.

Feel free to use the basics of the news story for inspiration, but make up your own details - change the place, the time, the specifics of the people involved (age, gender identity, personality). 

What news stories have stuck with you?

Questions to consider: What kind of people might be involved? What are their lives like? How did they end up in that situation? What will they have to do to get out of it? What might have happened years before or what might happen years after?

A Whole New World

Scroll through a list of photos (for example, this list) until you find one, or more, that sparks something for you, then pause and write your questions, wonderings, and ideas. 

Questions to consider: What kind of place is this? How did it get this way? Who might live or travel through it? How do they feel? What is it like for them there? What challenges do they face?

Source ⚜ Writing Notes & References

[literary-illuminati]

An Arbitrary Collection of Book Recommendations

(put together for a friend out of SFF I've read over the last couple of years)

Cli-Fi

Tusks of Extinction and/or The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler. They’re pretty different books in a lot of ways – one is a novel about discovering a certain species of squid in the Pacific might have developed symbolic language and writing, the other a novella about a de-extinction initiative to restore mammoths to the Siberian taiga – but they share a pretty huge overlap in setting, tone and themes. Specifically, a deep and passionate preoccupation with animal conservation (and a rather despairing perspective on it), as well as a fascination with transhumanism and how technology can affect the nature of consciousness. Mountain is his first work, and far more substantial, but I’d call it a bit of a noble failure in achieving what it tries for. Tusks is much more limited and contained, but manages what it’s going for.

A Half-Built Garden by Ruthanna Emrys. In a post-post-apocalyptic world that’s just about figured out how to rebuild itself from the climate disasters of the 21st century (but that’s still very much a work in progress), aliens descend from the sky and make First Contact. They’re a symbiotic civilization, and they’re overjoyed at the chance to welcome a third species into their little interstellar community – and consider it a mission of mercy besides, since every other species they’ve ever encountered destroyed themselves and their planet before escaping it. Awkwardly, our heroine and her whole society are actually pretty invested in Earth and the restoration thereof – and worried that a) the alien’s rescue effort might not care about their opinions and b) that other interest groups on earth might be more willing to give the hyper-advanced space-dwelling aliens the answers they want to hear. Basically 100% sociological worldbuilding and political intrigue, so take that as you will.

Throwback Sci Fi

Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky is possibly the only thing I’ve read published in decades to take the old cliche of ‘this generic-seeming fantasy world is actually the wreckage of a ruined space age civilization, and ‘magic’ and ‘monsters’ are the remnants of the technology’ and play it entirely straight. Specifically, it’s a two-POV novella, where half the story is told from the perspective of a runaway princess beseeching the ancient wizard who helped found her dynasty for help against a magical threat, and half is from the perspective form the last surviving member of a xeno-anthropology mission woken out of stasis by the consequences of the last time he broke the Prime Directive knocking on his ship tower door and asking for help. Generally just incredible fun.

Downbelow Station by C. J. Cherryh is, I think, the only thing on this list written before the turn of the millennium. It’s proper space opera, about a habitat orbiting an immensely valuable living world that’s the lynchpin of logistics for the functionally rogue Earth Fleet’s attempt to hold off or defeat rebelling and somewhat alien colonies further out. The plot is honestly hard to summarize, except that it captures the feel of being history better than very nearly any other spec fic I’ve ever read – a massive cast, none of them with a clear idea of what’s going on, clashing and contradictory agendas, random chance and communications delays playing key roles, lots of messy ending, not a single world-shaking heroes or satanic masterminds deforming the shape of things with their narrative gravity to be seen. Somewhat dated, but it all very impressively well done.

Pulpy Gay Urban Fantasy Period Piece Detective Stories Where Angels Play a Prominent Role

A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark stars Fatma el-Sha’arawi, the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities in Cairo, a couple of decades after magic returned to the world and entirely derailed the course of Victorian imperialism. There’s djinn and angels and crocodile gods, and also an impossible murder that needs solving! The mystery isn’t exactly intellectually taxing, but this is a very fun tropey whodunnit whose finale involves a giant robot.

Even Though I Knew The End by C. L. Polk is significantly more restrained and grounded in its urban fantasy. It’s early 20th century Chicago, and a PI is doing one last job to top off the nest egg she’s leaving her girlfriend before the debt on her deal with the devil comes due. By what may or may not be coincidence, she stumbles across a particularly gruesome crime scene – and is offered a deal to earn back her soul by solving the mystery behind it. Very noir detective, with a setting that just oozes care and research and a satisfyingly tight plot.

High Concept Stuff That Loves Playing around With Format and the Idea of Narratives

Radiance by Catherynne M. Valente is a story about a famous documentarian vanishing on shoot amid mysterious and suspicious circumstances, as told by the recovered scraps of the footage she was filming, and different drafts of her (famous director) father’s attempt to dramatize the events as a memorial to her. It’s set in a solar system where every planet is habitable and most were colonized in the 19th century, and culturally humanity coasts on in an eternal Belle Epoque and (more importantly) Golden Age of Hollywood. Something like half the book is written as scripts and transcripts. This description should by now either have sold you or put you off entirely.

The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez is the only classic-style epic fantasy on this list, I believe? The emperor and his three demigod sons hold subjugated in terror, but things are changing. The emperor, terrified of death, has ordered a great fleet assembled to carry him across the sea in pursuit of immortality. The day before he sets out on his grand pilgrimage to the coast, a guilt-ridden guard helps the goddess of the moon escape her binding beneath the palace. From there, things spiral rapidly out of anyone’s control. The story’s told through two or three (depending( different layers of narrative framing devices, and has immense amounts of fun playing with perspective and format and ideas about storytelling and legacy.

I Couldn’t Think of Any Categories That Included More Than One of These

All The Names They Used For God by Anjali Sachdeva is a collection of short stories, and probably the most literary thing on this list? The stories range wildly across setting and genre, but are each more or less about the intrusion of the numinous or transcendent or divine into a world that cracks and breaks trying to contain it. It is very easily the most artistically coherent short story collection I’ve ever read, which I found pretty fascinating to read – but honestly I’m mostly just including this on the strength of Killer of Kings, a story about an angel sent down to be John Milton’s muse as he writes Paradise Lost which is probably one of the best things I read last year period.

Last Exit by Max Gladstone – the Three Parts Dead and How You Lose the Time War guy – could be described as a deconstruction of ‘a bunch of teenagers/college kids discover magic and quest to save the world!’ stories, but honestly I’d say that obscures more than it reveals. Still, the story is set with that having happened a decade in the past, and the kids in question have thoroughly fucked up. Zelda, the protagonist, is kept from suicide by survivor’s guilt as much as anything, and now travels across America working poverty jobs and sleeping in her car as she hunts the monsters leaking in through the edges of a country rotting at the seams. Then there’s a monster growing in the cracks of the liberty bell, an in putting it down she gets a vision of someone she thought was dead is just trapped – or maybe changed. So it’s time to get the gang together again and save the world! This one’s hard to rec without spoiling a lot, but the prose and characterization are all just sublime. Oddly in conversation with the whole Delta Green cosmic horror monster hunting subgenre for a story with nothing to do with Lovecraft.

Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh is a story about aliens destroying the earth, and growing up in the pseudo-fascist asteroid survivalist compound of the last bits of the human military that never surrendered. It stars a heroine whose genuinely indoctrinated for the first chunk of the book and just deeply endearing terrible and awful to interact with, and also has a plot that’s effectively impossible to describe without spoiling the big twist at the end of the first act. Possibly the only book I read last year which I actively wish was longer – which is both compliment and genuine complaint, for the record, the ending’s a bit messy. Still, genuinely meaty Big Ideas space opera with very well-done characterization and a plot that does hold together. 

[phantoms-world-and-more]

An idea came to me reading a fic where Danny was a kryptonian. What if Amity Park instead of being a city in the USA on Earth was once a city on Krypton (in what would be a kryptonian version of early 21st century or at least about 100 years before the planet blew up). Basically almost everything that happened in cannon DP happened and everything is mostly the same but with a more alien then earth tone to it.

After Phantom Planet Danny's parents except him being part ghost, the government overturn the Ecto Acts, and he able to finish high school and goes on to college after which he is happily welcomed to for work for KASA (Krypton Aeronautics and Space Administration). He becomes an Astronautical engineer. Danny is in his early thirties when he is testing out a new experimental space ship engine for KASA. While doing a flight test Danny's ship losses signal and no one can find it (kind of what happened in the show Farscape).

100s of years go by Krypton explodes baby Kal-El is sent to Earth where he grows up to be Superman. The JL suddenly get a signal/warning about some alien tech on the edge of the solar system. They send one of the Green Lanterns to take a look, where they report a spaceship dead in space. They don't expect any life forms but surprise because of his ghost half Danny was in a sort of suspended animation. He is brought back and wakes up in the Watch Tower.

Just Random ideas...

Kryptonite is the crystalized form of ectoplasm because of this Danny is not effected by it.

Danny's kryptonian name is Daniel Fen-Ton

The phantom zone projector was originally called the Fen-Ton zone projector or is was based off a Fen-Ton gadget.

Years after Danny disappears Krypton starts turning on ghost again, so the town of Amity, which now has a symbiotic relationship with ghost, vote to pull the whole town into the Ghost Zone. So it is not blown up like the rest of the planet though Danny does not know this in the beginning.

Danny has an easier time learning to use Earth technology then he does the Kryptonian technology in Superman's Fortress.

Danny also has slightly easier time when getting the regular Kryptonian power set due to the yellow sun because he went through something similar when getting his ghost powers.

Danny adopts Connor almost immediately. Maybe during Danny's time there was laws about cloning and clone rights on Krypton. Also while Connor is not a replacement he sort of fills in the void of losing Ellie.

While Superman has no idea who Danny is, Kara/Supergirl has a faint idea because he was briefly mentioned in her Krytonian History class. Also she is happy to have someone who can natively speak the kyrptonian language even if it has older vocabulary. Don't get her wrong its great to speak it with Kal-El but he learned it later in life.

Holly char this is amazing!

How many people will have a stroke when they see Danny casually pick up a piece of kryptonite? Batman? His normal Kryptonian contingency plan won't work. Luthor? There's a version of superman IMMUNE to Kryptonite. Clark? What the hell do you mean you can touch kryptonite

I think after Danny explains everything about his past and species so many people are going to just...give up. Hahaha a stronger version of superman who isn't effected by kryptonite, goodbye world

Connor will be ecstatic, Danny will do ALL the dad stuff, teaching him their language, proper training, engineering lessons and you bet he's going to use jazz's psychiatrist stuff on this kid

Danny's probably going to get mega-depressed, all his hard work breaking the racism against ghosts only for that to come back a few years after he left? And he can't even fix it again because their world went bye-bye

Also- here me out

Co-pilot Valerie

[oranjeleeuw]

hows the pacific rim au going ???? its such a neat idea and i need ppl to draw concept art for it

DO I HAVE NEWS FOR YOU MY FRIEND

First of all, life happened and happened for good, I couldn't write much before but Now. NOW is the time.

I planned and plotted a lot during the whole year I first came up with the idea and I have a kind of strong base for the AU. I also have a brilliant beta by my side, my dear friend Frog (@faramircaptainofgender), so hopefully during this summer this idea will be shared with you all outside our little friend group.

I'll take this opportunity and shamelessly turn my answer into a main post for the AU.

 ╔════════════════╗

the title:

Human within the Machine

[brief synopsis]

The Nations of the world developed a simulation where future Jaeger pilots can practice for in-action cases. Max Verstappen outshines every other contestants in the history of drifting, there's only one problem - he's no team player.

Charles Leclerc is determined to stop the Kaijus and end their reign, once and for all. He lost his parents due to kaiju attacks, now he feels responsible not only to avenge their deaths, but to bring a brighter future to his brothers.

Jaeger engineering is living its golden age, there is money in it and many enthusiastic contestants who are not entirely aware of the horror that awaits them out at the ocean.

[disclaimer]

There’s no main plot (as in: I am not planning on detailed world-building neither to save the world from kaijus, I am smaller than that), the endgame is to get Max into an active combat where he drifts with Charles and they’re in the Il Predestinato (the legendary Jaeger that has been out of service for a decade, waiting for the right co-pilots). Everything before and in between are just themes I desire to explore within the possibilities of this AU.

 ╔════════════════╗

I have a playlist that helps me to stay inspired, songs are not in order yet though, but as I said earlier, chapters are meant to be kind-of standalone scenes, existing in their own moods and settings.

Each chapter will have its own chosen background music linked to them. I also added many symphonic songs just to get in the mood for some combat scenes.

 ╔════════════════╗

[good to know]

Roles: In the case of HwtM we have active and passive characters in this story. Due to the fact that many scenes are set in drift-memories, where not everything is factual and we are in the mix of memories and feelings, some characters will only appear and speak through these moments. Therefore they fall into the passive category - they are the legends. I will talk about them in their own post but the gist of it is what I wrote above, they cannot speak for themselves so we will only see them through tilted lenses: idolised, villanised, or the mix of both.

Which also means another thing - everyone is an unreliable narrator.

Teams and Jaegers: Since this is the golden age of Jaeger engineering, we will have many-many Jaegers. So far I named only a few, but to stay true to the source material, I'm trying to make them just as cheesy yet compelling as the ones were in the movies. The constructor teams from real life are not so different from what they represent in HwtM, but I altered some of their names to fit more into the world (older names or older sounding names of some teams since the future that Pacific Rim has is basically our present. I was aiming for some retro-vibe).

Here, they are different detachments under the Pan Pacific Defense Corps, in the Jaeger Academy division. I’m planning on working with Merc, Ferrari, McLaren, Williams and of course Redbull.

Mercedes is called Benz

Ferrari is called Alfa Romeo

Red Bull is Toro Rosso

The other two stay under the same name.

Ships to look out for: it is a Lestappen-centered story (if I am really honest with you, it’s Max-centered first of all) but on the side-lines we will look into some depths of Carlando, Galex and Maxiel in…some way. Please-please keep in mind, that these won’t be fully developed romantic relationships in the fic, I’m reporting from the minds and souls of these boys, objectively perceived scenes between them will be rare and much more comrade-like.

 ╔════════════════╗

That is all I planned to share for starters. Feel free to ask about the process or anything really, that is related to this project, it’s my beloved child and can’t wait to share it all with others!

[fxckn-sxck-fr]

𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐁𝐑𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 — 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝐈𝐈𝐈

Yandere Dick Grayson x GN Reader

❥ Part I >> Part II >> Part III >> Part IV

𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐗𝐓: This is basically just Dick metronoming between overly-coddling, emotionally distant, cool older brother, and scary. And also everyone collectively shaving 30 years off of Alfred’s life.

𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐈𝐍𝐒: platonic sibling yandere content, older brother Dick Grayson, younger sibling reader, non-vigilante reader, adopted reader, slow burn yandere(?), the pacing is very a-day-in-the-life-esque, overbearing Dick Grayson, lowkey-infantilism, flu-shot/needles (barely mentioned), emotionally constipated Bruce, estranged father Bruce, Dick is a liar (his pants are indeed on fire), Dick just knows shit somehow, Dick’s lowkey a dick, scary Dick Grayson.

“It’ll just be a little poke, kid. You’ll be fine.”

As much as you wanted to roll your eyes at the man’s babying, you couldn’t find the courage to do so. It had nothing to do with the upcoming needle (well, thinking about it may or may not have made you the tiniest bit apprehensive, but that’s besides the point). Rather, for the past 30 minutes or so, you’ve been haunted by the words of the lady at the front desk.

“A walk-in for flu shots today?”

A walk-in.

Dick said this was an appointment.

The whole reason why you were missing school today was because of this appointment. Dick scheduled it under the pretense that it was a Saturday rather than a Friday, and that’s why you were running around doing errands with him all morning instead of making up that damn world history test. So why the hell did she call it a walk-in instead of an appointment?

Of course, while you so desperately wanted an answer, there’s no way in hell you were asking; not after whatever… that… was earlier.

The absence of your response must’ve been translated as nervousness. “Hey,” Dick softly began, “it’ll be okay. I’ll be right here, alright?”

Before you could even think of what to respond with, the doctor walked in with a trey of needed utensils. When it was set down on the counter, you spotted the needle and packet of alcohol wipes, and you couldn’t help but quirk a brow at the array of different bandaids. There was the typical neutral type, but there was also ones with fun patterns, like rocket ships or flowers. The one with a classic comic book style caught your eye as the doctor began to talk.

“Sorry for the small wait,” she said, ripping open the packet of alcohol wipes. “Lots of people coming in for the flu shot.”

“‘Tis the season,” Dick chimed next to you.

You fought the urge to scoff at the doctor’s polite chuckle. Don’t validate his ego…

After instructing you to roll up your sleeve, she gently swabbed your upper arm with the cold alcohol wipe, the strong stench hitting your nose like a truck. Once that was done, she turned towards the counter to prep the needed, and you let out a small sigh. Once this was over with, you could finally go home and hide in your room for the rest of the day. It would finally grant you refuge from a whole day spent running around with Dick (he could be a fun guy, sure, but the awkward air of the morning was still lingering in the back of your brain, and you wanted some time to yourself to actually figure out what the hell the deal was).

A warm hand suddenly engulfed yours, causing you to flinch from surprise.

“It’s okay, kiddo,” Dick assured, stroking the back of your hand with his thumb. “You can always squeeze my hand if you need to.”

Your teeth aggressively bit down on the inside of your cheek. There were many things you wanted to say — “dude, I’m not a baby,” “the coddling is so weird,” “what the hell is up with you” — but you held them back the best you could, barely even registering the small prick in your arm until the needle was being pulled out.

“All done,” the doctor announced. You watched her put down the syringe on the tray as she picked up the different assortment of bandaids. “Hope you’re not too old for fun patterns. I’ve got tiger stripes, flowers, stars, butterflies…”

You obviously picked the comic book one, which you immediately regretted after hearing Dick’s small chortle (was he seriously making fun of you for choosing the objectively coolest looking bandaid?). As soon as the bandaid flaps were carefully rolled onto your upper arm, the doctor told you that the soreness should last for a couple of days, and before you knew it, you were hopping off of the chair and ready to go.

“Told ya you’d be fine,” Dick cooed, one of his hands coming up to pat your head. As if that wasn’t enough to rub you the wrong way, the doctor had the nerve to giggle at you two. Why was she endorsing this bastard’s behavior?!

And it gets worse. Because of course it does. After her little schoolgirl giggle, she let out a humored awww. Like she found your torment adorable in some sick way. You weren’t even worried about this to begin with, so what’s with all the infantilism, huh?!

God, I just wanna go home…

He was out for the night; you had to double, triple check just to make sure. Hell, you even looked up the Nightwing-sightings Twitter account to confirm that he was, in fact, out of the house (fortunately, a video of him grappling to Bludhäven’s Orthodox Cathedral was posted 7 minutes ago, which meant he was on the other side of the city). When you were 100% absolutely certain that — beyond a shadow of a doubt — he wasn’t hiding somewhere in the apartment for whatever reason, you took a few deep breaths and conjured up the bravery to hit the “call” button on your phone.

… Beeeeeeeeep…

… Beeeeeeeeep…

“Master (Y/N), is everything alright?”

A small sigh of relief left your lips. Alfred’s voice sounded fully awake, and you could even hear the clinking of dishes in the background of the call. Not even questioning why the butler was doing dishes at midnight, you tried to make your voice sound casual. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Just wanted to check up on the manor.”

“It’s a rather rare night, here. For once, Master Bruce is asleep upstairs at this hour.” His tone then shifted to something more pointed. “Much like you should be.”

“And you,” you shot back. “Why are you awake if Bruce isn’t?”

“I’ve found myself working on The Batman’s schedule,” the old man explained, speaking over the squeak of a cabinet. “I usually don’t sleep for another couple of hours, when Master Bruce returns from his nightly activities.”

Well, that explains why breakfast is closer to lunch in Wayne Manor. Before he could return the question, you decided to cut to the chase. “Do you think it’d be okay if I tried to call him sometime? Or sent him a text?”

“I believe a call would be an excellent idea.” You could’ve sworn you heard a chortle on the other end. “A text would give him the leeway to procrastinate, and possibly never answer. It’s better to catch him off-guard.”

Something about having to surprise-attack your own adoptive father with a conversation made your chest feel heavy. While you figured out very early on he didn’t like socializing (must suck to be a playboy billionaire CEO and an introvert at the same time), did he really want to avoid talking to you that badly? Ouch…

“Well,” you awkwardly shifted on your bed, “when’s the best time to call him, then?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to that,” replied Alfred. “But I’ll be sure to let you know when the opportunity arises. It’s about time the two of you actually talked, after all. Even if it’s just a simple hello.”

Your lips pressed into a thin line. If you were reading in between the lines correctly, Alfred was suggesting that a call with Bruce at this rate would be a simple, “hi, how are you, how’s it going,” exchange. Which, okay, makes sense, considering your adoptive father may as well be a stranger at this point (you honestly wouldn’t be surprised if you had to reintroduce yourself to him), but that meant it was going to take a while before you could even consider asking him if you could move back into the manor.

Which meant you were stuck in Blüdhaven for an indefinite amount of time.

Okay, it’s not like living with Dick is the worst thing ever. He’s starting to get weird, sure, but all of your basic needs are met, and you’ve got the added benefit of having Nightwing as your older brother, probably making you the safest kid in Blüdhaven right now. If anything, you were being totally ridiculous right now; trying to get in touch with your reclusive adoptive father — who obviously wants nothing to do with you at the moment — just because you didn’t want to talk to Dick about his weird behaviors.

(In other words, you’re opting to avoid the problem altogether instead of addressing it. Why does that sound eerily familiar…)

But nevertheless, even before Dick started to get weird, you’ve been extremely anxious about your relationship with Bruce (or lack thereof). It’d be nice to put your best foot forward and try to make up for being a burden to him.

“I’ll take what I can get,” you sadly admitted. “I just hope I don’t make him upset.”

“I can assure you, Master Bruce would be more than thrilled that you’re reaching out to him.” Ah. So now Alfred’s reverted to lying to you. “Now, it’s about time you get some sleep, don’t you think? Master Dick would be most displeased that you’re taking up The Batman schedule yourself.”

You tried to ignore the way your stomach churned at the mention of Dick. “I guess so… goodnight, Alfred.”

“Good night, Master (Y/N). I hope your next call is at a more reasonable hour for the sake of your sleep cycle.”

And, with that, the call ended.

Just in time to hear the window in the living room open.

“The Flash.”

“Fortnite.”

“Superman.”

“Wordscapes.”

“Green Lantern.”

“Which one?”

“Uh… the one with the brown swoopy hair.”

“Halo.”

“Wonder Woman.”

“Minecraft.”

The sputter you let out almost made you lose your focus. “Wonder Woman plays Minecraft?!”

“Not often,” Dick elaborated, “she only started playing because she saw Donna has it.”

You spared him a glance, though quickly returned your attention back to the computer screen on your lap. “Who’s Donna?”

“Well, you might’ve known her as Wondergirl…” the way that Dick referred to her in the past tense made your heart drop, “but she’s been bouncing between Darkstar and Troia recently. Lots of people still call her Wondergirl.”

Oh, thank god. She’s not dead. “Didn’t take Wondergirl for a Minecraft player.”

“She wanted to play with the rest of the Titans,” was Dick’s simple reply. “We’re hoping she doesn’t check in with the server, though, cuz Wally accidentally blew up part of her house and I don’t think any of us have fixed it yet.”

“And Wally’s Kid Flash,” you presumed, barely registering Dick’s hum of approval after you watched your character get knocked off the track. “Should’ve known the Titans are a bunch of gamers.”

Dick chuckled. “I don’t know about all that. We don’t get to play with each other often, with how busy our lives are, but it’s a nice way to goof around during the holidays.”

“What do you guys play?” You had to fight the urge to let out a curse upon seeing you got 1st place stolen from you. Total bullshit. “Besides Minecraft and, y’know, Garfield Kart.”

“Okay, to set the record straight, I’ve only played Garfield Kart once.”

“Mhm.”

“And Wally thought it would be funny.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And I figured it was fine to only spend 5 dollars on a game I knew I’d play once.”

“Why’s it still in your library, then?”

“Because I still spent money on it,” Dick retorted, his arms gesturing wildly in the air. “Might as well keep it just in case Wally wants us to play it again!”

“You’re getting oddly defensive about this.”

“Cuz it’s the truth!”

“Alright, then. Let’s see.” You dragged the mouse down to his dock and clicked on Steam, pulling up his library tab. “You have a total of 5 hours in Garfield Kart.”

“All from one night,” Dick tried to justify.

“You guys were playing Garfield Kart for 5 hours straight?”

“Roy was having connection issues!!”

“There’s no— I’m calling bullshit!!”

“I’m not making this up, I swear it’s the truth!!”

“Nah, man,” you were fighting through your giggling fits as best as you could. “I don’t believe it. 5 hours in Garfield Kart over connection issues??”

“I have witnesses!!” Dick started to fish into the pocket of his sweatpants for his phone. “I’m calling Wally right now. He’s gonna tell you the exact same shit, and you gonna formally apologize to me with a third party present to…”

Something on his phone screen made him trail off.

You at first thought it was because he couldn’t multitask between pulling up Wally’s contact information and talking. But his fingers weren’t doing anything, instead stagnantly clutching his phone. He looked to be reading something, like a notification on his lock screen. You watched in real time as his humored smile (a genuine smile, not a Richard Grayson smile), dropped into a deep frown. The switch up was enough to kill your own smile, brows knitting together as you asked, “what is it?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he muttered a curse under his breath and abruptly stood from his seat on the couch to make a b-line for his room. The door slamming shut caused your shoulders to jerk upwards, the sound echoing through your brain as you quickly put the pieces together; Nightwing was needed.

Low muttering came from his room — probably a phone call, though you weren’t a hundred percent certain on that — making you wonder just what the hell was going on. Was this a Gotham emergency? Titans emergency? Hell, even a Justice League emergency (if that’s the case, it’s a bit weird to think that Leaguers just text each other when they need back-up, but then again, you’re not entire sure what else they would do… there’s probably a whole system to it that you wouldn’t understand).

Dick’s bedroom door swinging up snapped you out of your thoughts, your pseudo brother now dressed in his Nightwing costume with his phone up to his ear. “I’ll call you back over comms. Just give me a minute, okay?” He then hung up, tossing his phone onto the couch and making his way to the window. “Duty calls, kid.” The pane of glass automatically slid open at his touch. “Leftovers are in the fridge if I come back late.” Before you could even ask what was going on, he jabbed a finger at you in an accusatory manner. “Stay put. You hear me?”

You thickly swallowed. “Try not to cause any explosions this time.”

A ghost of a smile danced on his features, and, within a blink of an eye, he was gone.

The apartment was eerily quiet now. Just a few minutes prior, you were laughing and carrying on about what games each Leaguer played, and now this happened. God, the vigilante lifestyle is one hell of a rollercoaster.

You’ve long forgotten about Garfield Kart, setting the laptop right next to where Dick’s phone landed on the couch. Instead, you tried to focus on taking deep breaths to keep your anxiety at bay. Dick was going to be fine. He’s always come home before, this time should be no different, right?

“I bet this is what Alfred thinks about Bruce,” you humorously thought out loud.

It’s probably what he thought about Jason, too.

… Not helping.

Taking another deep breath, you wrapped your arms around yourself and sank further into the couch. He’s going to be fine. If he’s coming in as backup, then that means he won’t be alone. Other heroes will have his back and make sure nothing bad happens.

“He’ll be fine,” you had to reassure yourself.

Everything’s fine.

Thunkthunk…

…

Thunkthunkthunkthunk…

…

Thunkthunkthunkthunkthunk…

Okay, either a giant bug was trying to get into your room in the middle of the night, or someone was at your window.

Your first thought was to ignore it. What if it was a murderer or a robber? There’s no way in hell you’re about to find out when Dick still hasn’t returned. That’s when you remembered, oh yeah, Dick still hasn’t returned, and that very well could’ve been him. Why was he trying to get into your room instead of the easy-access, less conspicuous window in the living room? No idea. But you decided to risk it anyway, rolling out of bed to face the window.

Sure enough, sticking outside of the building like an overgrown spider was Blüdhaven’s very own Nightwing, his blue stripes shimmering under the full moon. You could slightly make out the sheepish expression on his face as he asked, “could you let me in?”

If your brain wasn’t still foggy with sleep, you probably would’ve been an asshole and toyed with him for a bit, but it was too late for that. Flipping the window’s switch, the locking mechanism came undone with a resonate click, and you pathetically struggled to slide the glass upwards (in your defense, Bat-certified security windows are kinda heavy). Sparing you from further embarrassment, Dick helped out on his end. You found it unfair that he was able to make it look easy with one hand.

“You’re home,” you tiredly noted, allowing relief to flood your senses. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah. Yeah, everything’s alright.” As soon as he took a couple steps forward, you realized that everything was not alright. He seemed to be favoring his left leg over his right, limping towards your bed and sitting himself down on it as gracefully as he could. “Just some business in Gotham, is all.”

Your brows furrowed at how dismissive he was. “What happened to your leg?”

He didn’t answer for a few moments, instead working on tearing his domino mask off (there was an inky black substance left around his eyes, and you wondered if it was some sort of adhesive for his mask or something like that). “Uh… nothing too bad. I’ll be fine in the morning.”

“Nothing too bad,” you flatly echoed. “What does that mean?”

“Minor scratch,” he half-heartedly replied.

“… Right.” You didn’t believe him, but you couldn’t see any sort of obvious dents or deformities to his leg, so at least there was that. “So, is the living room window broken, or…?”

“Jammed,” was his curt answer.

For whatever reason, his total vagueness was starting to get on your nerves. Not only is he keeping you in the dark about what happened in Gotham, but he’s obviously lying about his leg and now reverting to giving you one-word answers. You also didn’t like how nonchalant he was being, like this has been scripted and rehearsed several times (god, he must’ve been a menace for Bruce and Alfred back in the day).

“Probably should get that fixed, then,” you said through a yawn.

“Yup.” He even popped the p. What a jackass. “Was everything fine while I was away?”

Christ. Even when asking a how were things question he sounds so dismissive. Maybe it was just because he was so tired after a long day. You should probably stop assuming he does everything out of pure condescending intent and general assholery. “Yeah, every—”

The sound of your phone ringing cut your answer short. Before you could make a move, Dick leaned across your bed to inspect your device picking it up and reading the caller ID. “It’s Alfred,” he chirped. Now, you would think he would hand the phone over to you (you know, cuz you’re the actual owner of the device), but you were grimly reminded that Dick was still the biggest bastard you know when he answered the call himself, bringing it up to his ear and greeting Alfred with a simple, “yo.”

“Dick, what the fuck are you doing,” you whispered, hoping that Alfred couldn’t hear you curse from the other end. You reached for your device, but he easily caught your hand with his free one.

“Yeah, it’s me,” he said over the line. He continued to talk with that stupid nonchalant tone, and from how Alfred’s voice bellowed out of your phone, you could tell the butler wasn’t having it. Attempted to obtain the device again, you swiped at it with your freehand, only for Dick to catch you off guard by pulling you towards his chest. You barely had time to start squirming before he locked you in place under his arm. “I’m fine, Alfred,” he said after he managed to finagle you onto his uninjured leg. “Honest. I am.”

Now that you were at a closer proximity, you could vaguely make out what Alfred was saying. “You had me scared to death, boy!! The least you could’ve done was answer your communicator, you know!!”

“Didn’t hear you trying to contact me,” he sheepishly replied, an almost chuckle spilling from his lips. “My comm must be jammed after the impact. Sorry, Alfred.”

First the window’s jammed, now his comm’s jammed. Why is everything jammed tonight?

… Also, what’s this about an impact?

“You’ve outgrown the manor and yet you’re still fixed on giving us heart attacks,” Alfred exasperatedly sighed. “Master Bruce was worried you were—”

“Hey, hey,” Dick reassured. “I’m okay, alright?”

You took this as an opportunity to speak up. “No, he’s not!! He did someth—gmgfhfmhm!!”

Dick partially stopped constricting your body to slam your face into his chest, muffling the rest of your sentence.

“… Master Dick, are you hurt?”

“No, Alfred.” A bit of venom laced Dick’s words, but he was quick to recover. “I’m fine. (Y/N)’s just being a little brat again.”

From the small beat of silence, you 100% knew Alfred was not buying Dick’s bullshit. But there wasn’t much the old man could do to call him out for it over the phone. “Well, then, how is Master (Y/N)? You seemed very worried over how they were—”

Dick didn’t even let Alfred finish. “They’re fine, but up way past their bedtime.”

… Wait a minute.

“Master (Y/N),” Alfred chided, this time directly talking to you. “What did I tell you about getting your proper rest?”

This. Mother. Fucker.

You tried to swivel your head out of his chest to A.) breathe again, and B.) give him a deadly glare. Why the fuck was he throwing you under the bus when he was the one that woke you up in the first place?! God, as soon as he lets you loose, you were gonna let him have it.

“It’sh no’muy fauh,” you defended, your words distorted from your cheek being smushed against Dick’s body. Unfortunately, Alfred still allowed his disapproval to shine through with yet another sigh, mumbling something about how everyone in this family is a hazard.

“Don’t worry, Alfred.” Dick shifted you on his lap so you were no longer being manhandled like a teddy bear. “I’ll get them to bed right now. Tell Bruce I’m fine, alright?”

“You should tell him yourself, boy!! He’s been trying to call you non—”

Dick then did the unthinkable; hang up on Alfred.

Oh, hell no. Absolutely not. You do not hang up on Alfred while he’s mid-chastising. Even if he’s a massive douche, Dick should know better than this, especially considering he was practically raised by the man.

So, as soon as he unceremoniously tossed your phone back onto your bedside table, you got vengeance on behalf of the butler.

CHOMP.

“OW!!” Dick unraveled his arm from your form, trying to rip his hand out of your mouth. “You little brat!! What the hell?!”

“Urr fveeinn uh pphrickhh!!”

Be some miracle, he managed to pry your teeth off of him, wiping the saliva off of his glove. “Care to repeat that, you vile creature?”

Spitting the taste of latex out of your mouth, you tried again. “You’re being a prick!! Why are you lying to everyone, huh?! I was worried, Alfred’s worried, Bruce is worried, and here you are, waving everyone off like it’s nothing?! What the hell even happened out there, huh?!”

Dick’s expression hardened. “(Y/N), it’s way too late for this.”

“No!! Don’t even do that!!” You shoved jabbed a finger into his chest. “You can’t come in here waking me up at… whatever the fuck hour it is right now and brush everything to the side!! You’re obviously hurt, dipped out on everyone over in Gotham without a word, have Alfred and apparently Bruce try to get in touch with you cuz they didn’t know what the fuck happened to you, and you expect me to not want any answers?! What’s your problem?!”

“My problem is that I have a high schooler yelling in my face like a 3rd grader,” Dick bitterly snapped. “People are trying to sleep right now, (Y/N)! What if you wake the one of the neighbors and they file a noise complaint?!”

“Wha— don’t try to change the—”

He grabbed your forearms tightly, catching you off guard and killing your sentence then and there. His tone got dangerously low as he pulled you closer to him. “I’m serious, (Y/N). Cut it out. Now’s not the time for this. Can’t you just listen to me for once?!”

… This was unfair. He’s trying to pull some intimidating authority bullshit on you, all to avoid actually answering you. It was so painfully obvious that’s what he was doing.

And yet, despite knowing that…

That look was back in his eyes.

It was the same coldness that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand at attention, vocal cords constricting as though your very subconscious was warning your brain to shut the fuck up as a self-preservation tactic. A ghost hand was creeping up your spine, sending electric signals of unease through your shoulders and into your skin.

Something was wrong again.

Something was so wrong again.

Even if you know this was all just some cheap intimidation tactic, it sure as hell was working.

“Fine,” you muttered, turning your head away so you didn’t have to continue eye contact with him. “But this isn’t over, okay?”

Dick didn’t have anything to say to that. Rather, he picked you up from his lap gently, setting you back down on your bed. “Get some sleep. Okay, kiddo? It’s been a long night.”

You merely hummed, watching him carefully. His calculating gaze — which still held that weird edge — scanned over your form before a certified Richard Grayson smile tugged at the corner of his lips. After a few seconds of just staring at you, he turned towards the door and began to limp out the room.

“Goodnight, (Y/N).”

“… ‘Night, Dick.”

Your door squeaked open, then softly clicked shut.

After he was gone, it dawned upon you that you were holding in your breath. Allowing yourself the gift of oxygen, you flopped back down on your bed, mulling over the timeline of the day. Hours prior, Dick left for a Gotham emergency, must’ve done something to fuck up his leg (you recall him saying something about an impact to Alfred), left for Blüdhaven without telling anyone, ignored comms because they were jammed, woke you up because the Bat Door (the living room window) was also jammed, and then the phone call with Alfred.

And also him being weird again (the scary weird this time, not the coddling weird), but you didn’t really wanna think about that right now.

In fact, if you were being honest, you realized you were too tired to think about everything else, as well. It really has been a long day, and you weren’t even the one dealing with Gotham bullshit (no, your job was to deal with Bat bullshit… batshit). All this dismissive lying shit really tuckers a kid out.

So, as your eyelids began to flutter shut, you could only mutter one last thing;

“… What the fuck is happening.”

[ressioo]

can i ask for your thoughts about sunstone as a ship and their dynamic 🥺

Sorry for taking a while, words hard

God. Sunstone. Both in regular canon and SolarFlare they're absolute cringefails to me. The latter just hide it better. Gonna be talking about canon for the most part here

Under the cut because wall of text lmao

Honestly canon sunstone is pretty tragic? Its two flawed people making every single bad decision, and eventually losing eachother as a result. By the time they actually Think and realise what they both did wrong, its much too late to apologise and make things right

I think that if the circumstances were different they'd be able to have a really good, wholesome relationship

Maybe if Pebbles was less desperate to find the triple affirmative. Maybe if the situation before Moons collapse was less tense, if Suns contacted him earlier. If Suns had thought a little harder about the consequences of sending that gold pearl, if they were a little less weak for him, less indulgent. 

I suppose that hindsight is everything. They both regret what happened between them. Especially at the end there. 

Okay now for less depressing shit lmao

Their relationship was purely mentor/mentee for a little while and slowly turned into a very close friendship. They both enjoy art, poetry and music and share many views, which they bonded over. And while Suns might not share the same love for history that he has, they're more than willing to listen. And maybe go out of their way to find out new tidbits for him if they can

They never confess, i don't think. They both develop feelings, but Pebbles is too busy to pay much attention to it and Suns just doesn't quite have the nerve to do anything except hint at it. Though this Does end in them sending him a personalised ring via Spearmaster. Which. Is basically a marriage proposal. At least by Ancient standards.

Pebbles doesn't realise this, mostly because that is a tradition practiced purely by the People. And since he's not exactly aware or paying attention to his own feelings he doesn't clock it for what it is.

He does send them back a ring though. Basically treating it like exchanging friendship bracelets or something 💀 Suns about has a heart attack. From what they know he doesn't share their feelings, and they're too much of a coward to inform him about what the gesture meant, so. They end up unofficially officially married. And then unofficially divorced once the second pearl reaches him in Spearmaster's campaign

Pebbles finally gets his shit together sometime during Arti's campaign. She brings back a pearl about marriage traditions and it suddenly clicks for him. Not really the best time to find out, honestly. What with everything going on. Not even truly Finding Out, since he can't actually ask them if thats what the whole thing meant. 

They never speak again, and neither gets closure about it. They both keep their rings though.

-

Now a little bit about SolarFlare specifically because they actually get together and meet in person in that! Wont be able to say too much without brain getting on my case for revealing too much though lmao. SF sunstone are Extremely exaggerated in their everything, so obviously not saying canon compliant off the string would be quite like this 🙏

They dont become a thing until they've actually met in person, though the line between being close and being Close was blurred for a bit before this point

Pebbles is the one that says something first, and they become official after that

They're like,, really abnormal about eachother. Like its genuinely obsession for them. They be jealous and posessive and codependent as hell. Both of them. Its not healthy, but they are genuinely really happy with eachother. Kinda made for eachother in that way. They're eachother's favourite people and they Will make it other people's problem

End up marrying at some point (after having an actual conversation about it this time), and its both because they wanna show love and devotion but also because they're very about it being a way to claim eachother. And that being visible to others

I love them and their weird relationship

[dearweirdme]

Different anon here…

I understand that people use context and common sense to interpret situations, and I agree that everyone fills in gaps to some extent but it’s important to recognize when interpretations might be more about personal biases or wishful thinking than objective reality.

You mentioned that Taekook’s history is different from Hobi and Tae’s, which is why one interaction might mean something different than the other. But isn’t that subjective? How do you definitively know what their interactions mean? It’s not like these are people you know personally. Without concrete evidence, isn’t it possible that what you’re seeing could be influenced by your own perspective rather than actual intent or meaning?

You said the whole Hello Kitty thing is not taking things too far but objectively it is because people are filling in gaps and treating it like facts. You don’t realize how harmful this is. Why do you think there are jikookers who despise Tae and Taekookers who despise Jimin? It is because they filled in gaps and then found reason to hate on them even though none of them has ever spoken ill of the other. People start filling in gaps and then going full force believing in those things and then when things turn out differently tomorrow how do you think they would react? What amount of damage do you think it would do even to the artists? There are obsessive fans out there who go as far as harassing members’ loved ones when things don’t work how they thought it would. It is always good to keep a healthy dose of skepticism. What if this interpretation is an example of seeing meaning where there might not be any? It’s easy to connect dots when we want something to fit a narrative, but sometimes those connections exist only in our minds and you don’t seem to realize how real confirmation bias is.

I think it’s necessary to ask yourself if you are truly observing what’s there, or projecting what you want to see? That distinction is crucial for staying grounded and avoiding over-interpretation. That’s all I’m saying.

Hi anon!

This is a very difficult thing to lay out, and I think where you are missing the mark is by making this a shipping issue. Imo it’s a fandom issue that also takes place in shipping spaces. If you look at solo spaces and Y/n spaces you will also find these things. I very much believe in personal accountability and I think every hateful remark is an individual’s decision to be awful. If me saying the Hello Kitty is special to Jk because of Tae makes someone send hate to Tae, Jk, or Jm.. that’s on them.

I also think you don’t understand how we are invited to fill in the gaps. That’s basically what the entertainment business is about when it comes to making fandom connect to their artists. I mentioned this before, but Jkk is actually a very good example of the company’s marketing strategy. I can’t actually blame Jkkrs for believing their ship, because they have basically been given reasons to do so. You can certainly argue about whether that’s a fair marketing strategy, but it absolutely is one and it’s one that’s used in probably every kpop group.

It’s also not as if members only get hate because of things we deduce. They get hate for the things they actually clearly do and say. Tae only has to mention Jk randomly and he will be called an attentionseeker. That is not because Tkkrs come up with stuff, that is because some just love hating on him. Jk and Tae smoke and get hate.

Let’s look at some shipping related issues to work through this. Jk got a lot of hate comments on his insta due to Jm’s dad using Jkk. I personally find it distasteful, but I do not feel it’s up to fans to send hate because of this. It’s up to Jk, Tae and Jm to deal with this. If they are fine with Jm’s dad making money out of Jkkrs, then my thoughts are just that I find it distasteful but it’s their business.

Another example is the hate Tae got for being in AYS. Jkkrs had no business complaining because clearly it’s been something both Jm and Jk wanted to happen.

Jm gets hate for touching Jk. Again, I feel that’s for them to deal with and for fandom to trust that these men know each other well enough to handle each other.

On filling in the gaps…. As long as we’re clear about these being our thoughts and not us actually speaking for a member, I think we’re good. I think we actually do follow what Tae and Jk themselves say a lot. My thoughts are that us shipping Jk and Tae is also very much an issue because of them being two men. I will never apologize or feel bad about thinking two men love each other.

I have never sent a hateful tweet or comment in my life. So I can’t really relate to people who have? I don’t know what motivates them? I’ve been on the receiving end of hateful messages and I think people maybe just take fandom issues too personally at times. They feel as though a member is theirs or an extension of themselves perhaps? So when I say something about Jm that a Jkk doesn’t like.. they feel personally attacked and their reaction is to send me hate. Personally I separate fandom shenanigans from BTS members. I don’t see Jkkrs as an extension of Jm at all. I don’t even agree with all Tkkrs just like many will not agree with me. But it’s not personal and (though I have certainly scolded people on here) it’s never something I feel justifies sending hate for. You can choose how to respond to things you don’t like.

[teaandchoux]

On Lizzie and Tommy Shelby

☆ A Yapping Session ☆

Notes: I've recently finished the last episode of Peaky Blinders and I have so much on my mind regarding the relationship between Lizzie and Thomas. There simply isn't enough content online to accommodate for my internet surfing, so I'll post my thoughts on here instead, mainly about why I don't think the ship would ever work out. Spoilers and (probably) many grammatical errors after the cut!

It isn't that I don't want to like Lizzie x Tommy - in fact, I was on my knees the entire show praying that they would work out. Eventually, though, I lose hope seeing their relationship struggle to move beyond a painful, one-sided love for the majority of the entire show (except towards the end, but more on that later). It gets to a point where they need a miracle to work.

I should also mention Grace. To me, her significance in the show seems greater when she's dead than alive. I didn't even think that she would make an appearance again after season 1, and that her role is to solidify the distrust Thomas has in others (caused by their entanglements followed by her betrayal). I don't dislike her at all, but I don't think I ever got the chance to truly invest myself in her story before she is already killed. What the show stresses most is the impact her death leaves on Thomas. He is tortured by grief, self-blame, guilt, etc.. So while I don't care much for Grace x Tommy, it's not difficult to see that Thomas will never love anyone as much as he loves Grace.

As for Lizzie, she is who Thomas turns to after Grace's death. They haven't had much of a romantic history beforehand, but a sexual one turned professional when he offers her a job as his secretary (I will try to avoid recounting everything in the show lest this gets boring). During this time, Lizzie acts as his emotional crutch. This doesn't mean much, just that he uses her body to distract himself from the grieving of his late wife. Although he is the one to promise her complete exemption from her past job as a prostitute, he breaks that promise once at the Derby race, then again by basically treating her like one to cope with the loss of his wife. The only difference now is that she is exclusive to Thomas, almost willingly so because she harbours feelings for him.

Their sexual relationship continues throughout the seasons, and he turns to her once more when memories of Greta (pre-war Thomas' lover) resurfaces. So really, up to this point, there isn't a time when he has sex with Lizzie, with Lizzie in mind.

Lizzie's pregnancy prompts their marriage due to the stigmas surrounding children born of wedlock at the time, so it obviously isn't out of love. Nothing particular changes afterwards and Lizzie remains a long shot from ever comparing to Grace. I probably will go back to this topic a lot, but the difference between Thomas’ interactions with Grace contrary to other women is huge. Their sex scenes (often in slow-motion with backing music, etc.) is exceptionally intimate in contrast to the furniture-thumping, lustful fucking he has with prostitutes. Lizzie unfortunately falls into the latter category. Where even well into their marriage, she has to personally demand they do it on the bed.

That whole episode really stands out to me regarding their relationship. Thomas has no qualms in bedding other women while married to her, and Lizzie knows this. Yet she only goes as far as to forbid him from doing it in their own home and not within a day of holding their daughter’s hand (I think). It’s pitiful and only gets worse when Thomas drops the statement that she is “his property” and no one else may touch her. That sounds like something younger me would read on Wattpad and giggle and kick my feet (shame on me), but there is nothing commendable or romantic about this. While Lizzie has to negotiate against his cheating, he brazenly chalks her up as an asset in his inventory, like he would a car or a horse. Possessiveness also isn't love (‼️). There is a clear power imbalance in their dynamics; Lizzie is never in control, Thomas is. He almost never listens to anyone, let alone her. It is always him who makes the decisions and she could argue all she wants but inevitably, she would have to be the one to submit.

More specifically about Thomas' infidelity, I would understand if he has sex with other women for the sake of furthering his plans, such as with Jessie. After all, he isn't in love with Lizzie or their political marriage, so it wouldn't burden him to cheat on her if it means that he gets what he wants logically. However, he doesn't just do that. He hires prostitutes and speaks to Lizzie within the span of seconds and doesn't bat an eye. At some point even basic respect is lacking in their relationship, a relationship that Lizzie has been so loyal to, yet she is constantly met with nothing but humiliation. She holds the title of being his wife, but what supports it other than some rings and legal documents?

Heading towards the last few episodes, Thomas strives to change his ways due to false news about his impending death. He becomes more considerate of Lizzie, shows his care more often and more openly, but their relationship couldn't be salvaged with the given time constraints. At some point, Thomas says "I love you" for what is probably the first time. The way I see it, though, is that he is pushing himself to love her because he knows that is what she wants, what will make her happy. It couldn't, and doesn't work, especially given the short time they have. Even if what he says is true, Lizzie ends up leaving him.

I like this ending. Thomas is right when he says that she deserves better. My gorgeous, breath-taking, soul-stealing queen does deserve better than him and it's about time they let go of whatever relationship they have. While Thomas cares for Lizzie immensely, their relationship is more toxic than not and he ultimately couldn't give her what she needs and deserves after all these years. Sometimes things don't work out and that's okay. I hope that they do not return to each other in the movie (if it comes out), but find separate, better lives for themselves.

Notes: that is all of my late night rant, i may just be spewing nonsense atp so do tell me if i've gotten anything wrong or if you have different takes on these topics. thank yew (❁´◡`❁)

[olderthannetfic]

I don't even think this is the type of thing you would normally get Asks about, but at this point I genuinely can't think of anyone better to come to and ask for their opinion.

I don't know if any of your followers have seen this situation as it's been occurring, but this massively popular mobile game that's been blowing up recently (called Love and Deep Space) has incurred a lot of drama and discourse as of a few days ago.

So LADS is an otome game, with a visibly femme/female protagonist who romances the male love interests. And a few days ago, the dev team behind LADS introduced this rule to all of their official groups and servers like Facebook and Discord: "Absolutely no BL materials are allowed to be posted or discussed in official spaces"

So, naturally, quite a few people are upset about what is basically a "no gays allowed" rule being forced onto the fandom. Because the "no BL" rules includes the posting of ANY queer content with "official" #LADS tags. Which for platforms like Twitter is absolutely unreasonable. They're stating that fanart of M/M ships can't be posted with any tags for the source material? It's ridiculous.

There's been people trying to defend it, saying things like "oh it's because of CN censorship laws" despite the fact that LADS isn't a CN game and the company isn't a CN company. Or "they only banned queer stuff in their official Discord and official Facebook group and for the official LADS tags on socmed!" even though that is still censorship and erasure of queer content (and somehow the fact that it's officially sanctioned makes it okay?)

But the worst part is the fact that there’s been an EXPLOSION of aggressive homophobia within the fanbase. It's as if all the cishet women who play the game were just waiting for their chance to go mask off, because the second those "no BL" rules were put in place the rampant harrassment and bullying started. People are getting attacked for M/M ship fanart, people are getting attacked for having male self-inserts or male MC or OC designs, and several artists have already been harrassed into deleting all of their artwork and leaving the fandom.

There's now a LOUD number of fans screeching that otome games "are only for girls" and that anyone even slightly queer or masc-leaning "doesn't belong in otome fandoms" and "needs to go play something else"

I've seen baseless accusations that "men want to force us to play as a gay male MC!" and "gay men are demanding that LADS turn the female MC male!" when absolutely no one anywhere has ever said anything close to that.

I have tried telling these fans that queer people, including queer men, have ALWAYS played otome games, that gay men and queer people have ALWAYS been a part of the otome community from the very beginning, but anyone who deviates even slightly from the new majority of "no gay shit allowed, otome is for straight women only and everyone else kys" gets immediately shouted down and harrassed/attacked. I know a lot of people have deleted the game and have stopped playing because of both the official "no gays" rule and also the extremely toxic and homophobic fanbase.

I was wondering if you knew about any resources (blogs, articles, anything) talking about the history of queer people playing otome/dating sim games, or even if you happen to know anything anecdotal about it yourself. Because we've ALWAYS been here, otome games have never been JUST for cishet women. I'm also just wondering what your/your followers' thoughts are about this whole mess in general.

--

Oof. I don't play many games of that sort, so I don't know a ton about their history, but there has often been pointless beef between the more self inserty types and the more m/m shipping types.

I don't think you need evidence that people besides cishet women consume media X. It should be self-evident from being a human who lives in the world. These people are denying it because they don't want it to be true, not because they do or don't have evidence.

"LOL, you're a homophobe in 2024? Criiiinge!" is the only appropriate type of response to these idiots. Facts won't help.

[zeroducks-2]

Zero you mentioned hating on people who get prissy about people shipping characters they dont actively ship and it sparked a LONG burning question of mine concerning bias shipping culture in Batfam fandom. Fans who attack and complain and make a big show of hating on ‘batcest’ ships ARE SO DUCKING HYPOCRITICAL OH MY LORD. I don’t understand why it’s considered okay to ship Dick x Barbara or Barbara x Bruce, or Steph x Tim. But seen as a cardinal sin to ship Jason x Dick, or Jason x Tim or Bruce x Dick??? Especially when the only argument antishippers make is ‘that’s gross their brothers/father and son and that’s incest 😤’. I’m sorry? Did you not just post nsfw Dickbabs content? Did DC not make Steph and Tim romantic love interests? Is that not incest too? Considering the fandom classifies all of them as family, and in a lot of fan spaces and fanfics, are they not interacting and being written as a family unit? I see SO many people blog about Bruce seeing Babs as his first daughter, or being making weird headcanons on Bruce and Steph’s relationship and donning it ‘tired uncle!Bruce and weird niece!steph core’. Like you obviously see them connected to Bruce through familial ties, and yet you’re okay with them dating Dick and Tim who are legally adopted by Bruce and who are also known as his sons? The irony. The hypocrisy. The ducking mockery of it all. Personally, I don’t think the issue that antishipper have is the ‘incest’ part but rather the ‘gay’ part of it all. Game of Thrones taught me that the general public actually don’t care about fictional incest between characters as long as it’s not between two male characters. Because lord forbid the’s a couple of queers in media.

I have been talking about this many times and I have no qualms talking about it some more:

✨ IT'S NOT INCEST, YALL JUST HOMOPHOBIC ✨

The whole idea around "batcest" makes no sense. These are people who did not grow up together, aren't related and never even lived under the same roof. Incest is not a spectrum, incest means sexual intercourse with a relative within the prohibited degree of consanguinity, consanguinity means BLOOD RELATIONSHIP, and these people DO NOT HAVE IT.

But even then, they are a bunch of hypocrites because I have not ever seen anyone batting an eye over Dickbabs or Timsteph (or Jaybabs, or Timbabs - yeah depending on the time period or the media, poor Babs has been passed around a lot). Their relationship is the exact same as the boys' when it comes to shared experiences. Steph has even been a Robin. But nobody cares because 1, DC is not pushing the "family rhetoric" with the girls all that much since they treat them as lower importance characters (when they're there at all), and 2, it's not queer relationships.

And this is ultimately what makes me go insane about queer kids parroting anti bullshit. Censorship is the weapon used by bigots to criminalize, punish and ultimately erase queer people from existence, it takes to study queer history for five minutes to understand this. You can see it happening in every fandom space where every type of queer ship gets put through some sort of moral sieve, and they WILL find reasons why it's unethical to ship it. Did you know that now shipping Dick/Wally is problematic because "Wally has a wife" ? So basically they're turning the very reason why fandom was born (exploring something different from the standardized heteronormative/amatonormative way of doing everything when it comes to narrative) into something pRoBLeMaTiC.

And these little fucking idiots keep spouting queerphobic nonsense while feeling morally righteous, not understanding that they are playing the game of the same people who if they could would shoot them in the street for being anything but straight and cis. And I'm not even taking into consideration the amount of harassment that comes from antis who think bullying and suibaiting someone over the perceived honor of fictional characters is okay.

BTW it's working. Just to name one, tumblr is not even doing its little rainbow capitalism number this year, because it's not a good look to be queer friendly anymore. Antis are helping the people who want us dead get to a spot where being anything but "normal" is illegal. When it happens, and if we keep going the way that we are now it will happen, it's going to be their fault too.

[crepes-suzette-373]

In chapter 1066, Shaka explained this story about the Void Century. It was a big dramatic reveal scene, and most of the chapter was about Ohara and their research efforts on the Void Century. In the cover, sensei chose to depict a zoomed out view of the Germa castle, with all its "66" banners.

Is this a coincidence or a hint?

Based on the fragmentary snippets that we've heard of Germa's history, it sounded almost like... Germa's destruction is a "smaller scale" version of what happened to the ancient kingdom. They were able to continue to exist somehow, but their history was so obscured that barely anyone know the truth about them.

Even someone like Brook was only able to vaguely know that "they conquered North Blue".

Previously I assumed that World Government destroyed the empire, but I now consider the possibility that the other North Blue kingdoms just allied together to defeat it. A mirror of the Void century history, but localised in the North Blue instead of the whole world.

Judge had said he wanted revenge against the North Blue kings. It would stand to reason that he might have wanted to do that because the other kings banded together to take down Germa 300 years ago.

Germa might have been allowed to continue to exist as a smaller kingdom because WG is not involved in the destruction. They just turned a blind eye towards its destruction.

That being said, though, I have been suspecting for a while that Germa is hiding knowledge related to the old Void Century kingdom.

Germa has been a kingdom of science for generations, but lineage factor and cloning was Vegapunk's discovery. So what was Germa doing before?

Very likely, it's something more similar to what we would call "engineering" in our world. Back in MADS, Judge was seen building that spear that would eventually become his main weapon.

Not to mention that even in the drafts, sensei had planned for Judge to be titled "Earl of Mechanisms". Both of those, plus the snail ships and the raid suits, they all seem to suggest that Germa's main scientific endeavours before were machinery and gadgets.

So, when did Germa develop the snail ships and why? If these were newer, then I would be wondering "What did the Germa kingdom look like before they made the snails? Just normal ships?".

However, if these ships have been around since their land's destruction 300 years ago, then was the Germa empire's eventual goal to conquer the entire world? Why else would they need the snail ships that can climb the Red Line otherwise? Did maybe the old empire had wanted to make All Blue? Perhaps due to their knowledge of the Void Century?

This assuming that All Blue here is not a specific location, but just "the open sea" in general, not blocked by the Red Line.

Something about all this is just so weird.

I had the vague idea that Sanji is going to ironically be the one to "fulfil the goals of the old Germa empire", which was originally not evil whatsoever. I just don't know what the hell that "goal" is. But if their goal was in fact "All Blue", then it's an even more insane irony. It also fits the samurai conspiracy I had (TL;DR, basically "unification").

Another thing related to the machinery.

Is it possible that Germa had been the one to send the ancient robot up to the Red Line? Nobody knew who sent this robot, and it just died midway because it ran out of power.

It's possible that it was done by some other unknown entity. For example, from the same island as Professor Tsukimi who built the small automatons, since that shows that there's someone knowledgeable in robotics. Or maybe the robot just woke up on its own and started moving around. Especially with the revelation in chapter 1111 where it woke up apologising to Joy Boy.

But if Germa is a nation with very advanced ability in mechanics, it could be that they found the ancient robot and reactivated it. They just might not have known how to refuel/charge it up, so it collapsed midway.

It's rather unlikely, but it's not impossible.

This is also somewhat related to how the snail ships were able to climb the Red Line. If the old Germa's ambition was something to do with the Red Line (like, perhaps destroying it), then it's not unreasonable to think that they would try to send this powerful looking robot to do the job.

[disenchanteds]

ok heres more

so another alliance is ren and martyn and idk when it atarted i just know they they are like Max Gay Yearning, their ship name is treebark and a whole handful of other ship names and oh the things i could tell you about how much gay yearning they have and the amount of times they mention one another on stream and when one of them pops up on the others stream they immediately turn into gay dramaticised theater kids on the gayest play possible they are horrible and i could write an entire gdocs about all of it but lets not since this is long already

next we have bdubs etho and tango. now bdubs and etho are already close on hermitcraft and so this teamup is more like a "boyfriends and. steve." teamup where they dont even regard tango most of the time and seem to not actually really like him? idk whats going on there

next we have the Feared Duo or gem and joel, both really well known for being extremely good at pvp and Will Kill You If Provoked. they may go on a murder spree or kill themselves or spontaneously combust at any second. we may never know. right now gem is putting up with joel annoying her and trying to keep joel in line and making friends with everyone but that will def change as time goes on.

NOW the spiciest team-up, GGG and Impulse. brief history here : GGG is gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss or cleo, scott and pearl in that order i believe. they were an amazing alliance in last life. cleo and scott turned on pearl in double life and manipulated everyone into hating her. pearl kept her distance during limited life and secret life. they sorta teamed up in real life (the one-off ep april fools, they used vr) but then there was this whole thing that caused cleo to kill pearl so welp. and then now. they are all allied again. bitter, petty, but somehow allied, with biting quips and bantering with one another that can go far considering they are a teamup of british, scottish and australian. so hm. and impulse is just there. between the four of them only impulse hasnt won (scott won last life, pearl won double life, cleo won real life) and for some reason impulse has been antagonising others and scott and cleo keep dismissing pearl's trauma from double life after they left her just because she won. like okay sure. this is a team on the constant verge of breakup but the four of them have always been pretty loyal to their alliances and so what is keeping them together is just Pure Spite and "i am loyal i guess.." oh and also pearl accidentally died from fall damage first because she shrunk and shifted too close to the edge and minecraft didnt register her as an entity and just pushed her off...so

and then there is bigb, who is off doing weird stuff and being alone and generally creepy and ok. heres the thing. so bigb is african american i believe and well. theres a new wood type in minecraft called pale wood that is basically white in color and. for some reason. bigb has. on his own volition. built a giant building shaped like his minecraft avatar face except instead of using like spruce or dark oak wood he used pale wood so hes basically like...white washing himself??? in minecraft??? in a death game??? i mean okay u do u i guess???

and yeah thats that and i havent even touched on ep 2 yet but ep 2 is also. well gempearl divorce arc if i say the least

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #6 – Exordia by Seth Dickinson

This is a book I have been looking forward to for quite literally years, from someone who is easily one of my favourite working authors. I also read the short story the book was expanded out from before I even knew it was going to be a book, and so went in spoiled on the broad strokes of what turned out to be the climax of the whole thing. All to say my opinion on this is unlikely to match that of the typical reader, I guess.

Anyway, Exordia is a glorious spectacular mess that has no right to cohere anywhere near as well as it does. It’s target audience is small, but I’m certainly somewhere in it. Please ignore all the marketing it’s so bad you have to wonder if someone at Tor just has it out for the author.

Exordia is a, well, a profoundly difficult book to give any sort of plot summary for. The first act involves Anna, a 30-something survivor of the Anfal Genocide now living a rather unimpressive life in New York City, until one day in the early 2010s she sees an alien eating the turtles in Central Park. Then there’s a cat-and-mouse hunt between terrifying alien snake-centaurs for the future of free will in the galaxy, and the plot jumping to kurdistan, and six more POV characters from as many different nations, and nuclear weapons, and oh so many people dying messily. The first act is an oddly domestic and endearing piece of table setting, the second is (to borrow the idiom of the book’s own marketing) Tom Clancy meets Jeff Vandermeer or Roadside Picnic, and the third is basically impossible to describe without a multipage synopsis, but mostly concerned with ethical dilemmas and moral injuries. It’s to the book’s credit that it never bats an eye at shifting focus and scale, but it does make coming to grips with it difficult.

This is, as they say, a thematically dense book, but it’s especially interested in the fallout of imperialism. The Obama-era ‘don’t do stupid shit’ precise and sterile form of it in particular – the book’s a period piece for a reason, after all. The ethics of complicity – of being offered the choice of murdering and betraying those around you or having an alien power with vastly superior destructive powers inflict an order of magnitude more misery to you, them, and everyone in the same general vicinity to punish you for the inconvenience – is one that gets a lot of wordcount. It is not an accident that the man most willing and able to collaborate with the overwhelming powerful alien empire in hopes of bargaining some future for humanity is the National Security Council ghoul who came out of organizing surveillance information for the drone wars. It’s also not a coincidence that the main (if only by a hair) protagonist is someone with a lot of bitter memories over how the US encouraged Iraq’s kurdish population to rebel in the ‘90s and then just washed their hands and let them be massacred (the book couldn’t actually ship with a historical primer on modern kurdish history, so it’s woven into the story in chunks with varying amount of grace. But it is in fact pretty thematically key here).

Speaking of complicity, the book’s other overriding preoccupation in (in the broadest sense) Trolley Problems. Is it better to directly kill a small number of people or, through your inaction, allow a larger number to die? Does it matter is the small number is your countrymen and the larger foreigners, or vice versa? What about humans and aliens? Does it matter whether the choice is submitting to subjugation or killing innocents as a means to resist it? What about letting people around you die to learn the fundamental truth of the cosmos? Does the calculus change when you learn that immortal souls (and hell) are real? This is the bone the story is really built around chewing on.

All that probably makes the text seem incredibly didactic, or at least like a philosophical dialogue disguised as a novel. Which really isn’t the case! The book definitely has opinions, but none of the characters are clear author-avatars, and all perspectives are given enough time and weight to come across as seriously considered and not just as cardboard cutouts to jeer at. Okay, with the exception of one of the two aliens who you get the very strong sense is hamming it up as a cartoon villain just for the of it (he spends much of the book speaking entirely in all caps). There definitely are a couple points where it feels like the books turning and lecturing directly at the reader, but they’re both few and fairly short.

The characters themselves are interesting. They’re all very flawed, but more than that they’re all very...embodied, I guess? Distracted with how hot someone is, concerned with what they ate that morning or the smell of something disgusting, still not over an ex from years ago. Several of them are also sincerely religious in a way that’s very true to life to actual people but you rarely see in books. The result is that basically comes as being far more like actual humans than I’m at all used to in most fiction (of course, a lot of those very human qualities get annoying or eye-roll inducing fairly quickly. But hey, that’s life). Though that’s all mostly the case at the start of the book – the fact that the main cast are slowly turning into caricatures of themselves as they’re exposed to the alien soul manipulation technology is actually a major plot point, which I’m like fifty/fifty on being commentary on what happens to the image and legacy of people as they’re caught up in grand narratives versus just being extended setup for a joke about male leads in technothrillers being fanfic shipbait.

Part of the characters seeming very human is that some (though by no means all) of the POVs are just incredibly funny, in that objectively fucked up and tasteless way that people get when coping with overwhelming shock or trauma. It’s specifically because the jokes are so in-your-face awful that they fit, I think? It manages to avoid the usual bathetic trap a lot of works mixing in humour with drama fall into, anyway.

Speaking of alien soul manipulation technology – okay, you know how above I said that the points where the book directly lectured the reader were few and far between. This is true for lectures about politics or morality. All the freed up space in this 530 page tome is instead used for technobabble about theoretical math. Also cellular biology, cryptography, entropics, the organization of the American security state, how black holes work, and a few dozen other things. This book was edited for accuracy by either a doctoral student from every physical science and an award winning mathematician, or else just by one spectacularly confident bullshitter with several hundred hours on wikipedia. Probably both, really. I did very much enjoy this book, but that is absolutely predicated on the fact that when I knew when to let my eyes glaze over and start skimming past the proper nouns.

The book has a fairly complete narrative arc in its own right, but the ending also screams out for a sequel, and quite a lot of the weight and meaning of the book’s climax does depend on followthrough and resolution in some future sequel. Problematically, the end of the book also includes a massive increase in scale, and any sequel would require a whole new setting and most of a new cast of characters, so I’m mildly worried how long it will be before we get it (if ever).

The book is also just very...I’m not sure flabby is the right word, but it is doing many many different things, and I found some of them far more interesting than others. I’m not sure whether Dickinson just isn’t great at extended action scenes or if I am just universally bored by drawn out Tom Clancy fantasies, but either way there were several dozen pages too many of them. The extended cultural digressions about the upbringing and backstories of each of the seven POVs were meanwhile very interesting! (Mostly, I got bored of the whole Erik-Clayton-Rosamaria love triangle Madonna complex thing about a tenth of the way into the book but it just kept going.) It did however leave the book very full of extended tangents and digressions, even beyond what the technobabble did. Anna herself, ostensibly the main protagonist, is both utterly thematically loadbearing but very often feels entirely vestigial to the actual, like, plot, brought along for the ride because she’s an alien terrorist’s favourite of our whole species of incest-monkeys. The end result is, if not necessarily unfocused, then at least incredibly messy, flitting back and forth across a dozen topics that on occasion mostly just seem unified by having caught the author’s interest as they wrote.

It’s interesting to compare the book to Anna Saves It All, the short story it was based on – quite a lot changed! But that’s beyond the scope of this already overlong review. So I guess I’ll just say make sure to read the book first, if you’re going to.